Rose Pale
by kuroiyousei
Summary: Trowa is determined to remain at his master's side through anything and everything, even if Quatre has sworn to spend the rest of his life in an enchanted palace in the middle of the forest, and even if their relationship can never become what Trowa really wants
1. Chapter 1

((This is a faerytale AU in which the primary pairing is Quatre and Trowa, followed closely by Heero and Duo. Story contains language (some gendered), sex, angst (including references to suicide), homophobia, and some minor non-specific religious references.))

* * *

"I don't like the sound of that."

The forest was dense enough here that the tangled trees obscured the sight of most of the sky, but the rumble of thunder that seemed to come from just yards above them, combined with the increasing darkness several hours before sunset and a certain heavy, crackling feeling to the air, was enough to indicate exactly what they were in for.

Quatre sighed. "You were right; we should have stayed at Wilshire. I shouldn't have insisted."

"You couldn't have known it would do this," Trowa shrugged, seeming largely indifferent to the prospect of rain. He did urge his mount to greater speed, however, as soon as Quatre did.

Again Quatre sighed. "Getting caught in a rainstorm will be a perfect addition to this wonderful journey."

"You'll make things worse if you talk like that."

"I don't think things really _can_ get any worse. I can't imagine how father's going to take this..."

For this Trowa had no answer, so they rode on in silence but for the thunder and the growing wind. But eventually Quatre's frustration and disappointment found vent again. "I can't believe our bad luck! That ship was nothing like the _Radius_! What was he thinking?" This was perhaps the fifth time he had made this particular complaint today.

"He thought he was doing your father a favor," Trowa said calmly, and this not for the first time either.

"Even the _good_ news - the _supposed_ good news - was almost too much for father. Then to get _this_ kind of news after he's been worried about me - about us - for weeks..."

"It's kind of you to include me, but I doubt he's been too worried about me."

"Oh, I'm sure he has," said Quatre a little impatiently.

"He's been trying harder than ever to dismiss me lately."

"Only because he thinks you deserve better than almost no pay - which is completely true." A touch of moisture on Quatre's face made him raise the hood of his much-worn cloak up over his head and down as far as he could pull it without obscuring his vision too badly.

As Trowa again had nothing to say, they continued without speaking for a while; eventually their silence became more a matter of necessity than preference as the rain began to pour down with such noisy vengeance that conversation would have been impossible. The thickness of the trees was no help whatsoever in keeping the water off, and both horses and riders bent their heads and moved onward with dejected determination.

When they'd come this way two weeks ago, they'd paid a few copper coins to sleep in the barn at a forester's home; Quatre had hoped to reach this not too long before midnight tonight, spending several extra hours on the road rather than stop in the afternoon at the town on the edge of the forest, in order to shave half a day off the return journey. He hadn't counted on the rain - or, at least, he hadn't counted on rain this severe - and had no idea how it would affect their time.

Things only got worse as they progressed: the rain came down even harder, the forest around them grew even darker, and the downpour and the thunder grew even louder. And the relatively unfamiliar path, the poor visibility, and their uncertain pace rendered it impossible to tell exactly where they were facing after any bend, so that when they approached a fork in the road leading off in fairly divergent directions, Quatre realized he hadn't the faintest idea which way to go.

Trowa pulled up close beside him, and under his hood Quatre could just barely make out his slight frown.

"I don't remember this!" Quatre said, loudly enough to be heard - it was more of a shout, really. "Which way is north?"

Trowa shook his head. "Stay here." And, without waiting for a reply that he probably wouldn't have heard anyway, he began to ride down the right-hand path. Almost immediately he was lost to sight, and even sooner to hearing, and Quatre shivered in the sudden loneliness of the drowning black forest without him. It was not long before Trowa returned, however, reappearing with startling suddenness out of the blind and coming back to Quatre's side. "The other way," he called, pointing down the left-hand path, and together they set off in that direction.

The horses were little pleased by the ever-increasing muddiness of the road as it dipped down into a swimming dell among the trees, but, bred for endurance as they were, had the sense to know that refusing to move further would only make things worse. So they plodded along, splashing dirty rainwater all over themselves and each other and their riders, who, if possible, were soon even more soaked than the storm from above had already rendered them. Their surroundings were mostly invisible but for slight glints of reflection off the wet, churning ground, but the occasional filter of lightning through the trees from high overhead revealed a low mist of rebounding rain surrounding the horses' legs and the dark road stretching, level and marshy, until it disappeared into blackness ahead.

Quatre was thoroughly miserable. He'd meant it when he'd said he doubted things could get much worse, short of the news he brought actually killing his father; he really felt they'd hit rock-bottom on this endeavor, and the weather - and his own foolish choice that had led him into it - was simply the last nail in the coffin.

And he'd dragged Trowa into it, too. Granted, Trowa had insisted on accompanying him on this journey, and had only protested minimally, earlier today, the idea of riding so long and so far this evening, but that didn't make this any less Quatre's fault. The fact that they were soaked to the bone and likely to catch their deaths in this dreadful, mud-spattered after-dark forest far from home was his fault, anyway. The business with the ship was not. Quatre was not about to start claiming responsibility for somebody else's mistake.

The ground eventually began to rise again, bringing them, thankfully, out of the watery dell but also providing, with its grade, a more difficult path; hooves slipped on the muddy upward track, and the travelers reeled as their mounts struggled thus unsteadily on. Quatre was torn between thinking it a miracle that he even retained his seat and trying to recall this spot from their journey a week ago. Admittedly from the other direction and in dry conditions he wouldn't have had nearly so much reason to notice it, but surely he would remember such a steep hill...

Finally the way leveled again, and another flash of lightning showed them a gentle curve into what appeared to be thicker trees ahead; this was confirmed when the amount of rain battering their hooded heads seemed to slacken a little as they proceeded. For a while the road, narrowing gradually, twisted through the ever-encroaching foliage, forcing them to ride even closer together, until unexpectedly both forest and road opened out again. Emerging suddenly from a particularly dense tangle, they found they could actually see the sky in lightning-marked patches through the trees above. The storm had lightened, too, while they rode through the deeper part of the woods, and the overwhelming darkness and the deafening roar of the previous downpour had both lessened.

"I don't know if we came the right way," Quatre said, reining up and gazing into the angry sky.

Mutely Trowa, pausing his own mount beside him, followed his gaze.

"Nothing we've been riding through has seemed..." But Quatre trailed off. His eyes, scanning their surroundings from the deeply shadowed, tunnel-like stretch they'd just left to the rain-hazed trees on either side of the road to the latter's straight length before them, had caught sight of something promising: light - not the cuttingly brief purple-white of lightning, but the welcoming, lingering orange-gold of fire or lamp - flickered somewhere ahead of them. It was only intermittently visible, distance and storm making it uncertain at first, but, as Quatre peered through the rain, as surely as the light disappeared, it always returned.

"Do you see that?" he asked Trowa. "There's light ahead."

Trowa looked, craning his neck slightly, and finally nodded.

"So we're on the right track after all," Quatre said in some relief.

Finally Trowa broke his silence to amend this sentiment with some dourness, "Or at least there's fire ahead."

Now it was Quatre's turn to nod, and he urged his horse forward once again. Even if they did turn out to have gone the wrong way, hopefully that light represented some place they could stay and obtain directions on how to re-find their proper path.

The storm had lessened, but night was drawing on, and the darkness that had previously oppressed them under the heavy cloud was returning in earnest; and as the lightning became less frequent and then almost entirely ceased, at least in this vicinity, there was little to break the hold of blackness that gradually settled over them. They had to trust to their horses' keener senses to keep from riding right off the path. This, however, only made the lights ahead brighter by contrast, and their hope of reaching them that much sharper.

The lights were strange, though. They were too numerous to be merely the cottage Quatre had been expecting, but oddly placed for a town, unless it was a town spread out impossibly across the face of a mountain cliff. And while it was conceivable that the travelers had indeed taken a wrong road and come straight west toward the mountains, Quatre knew of no settlement in the area that could explain so many lights.

"What _is_ it?" he wondered.

"Windows in a large building?" Trowa suggested.

"It would have to be a _very_ large building..."

And so it proved. A sudden, final, straggling flash of lightning revealed to them briefly the silhouette and certain proud faces of a great stone structure many storeys high, its outline encompassing the myriad little lights that had so puzzled them: a huge mansion or a palace, standing alone in a clear area of some sort that they had nearly reached. The rain had quieted as the bulk of the storm had moved away, and after the distant thunder following that last lightning, everything seemed to fall abruptly, eerily silent, as if giving them a moment to appreciate fully what they'd just glimpsed.

Quatre had halted his horse. "Where in God's name are we?" he wondered.

Trowa, who'd stopped beside him, shook his head and murmured, "I've never heard of anything like that out here."

Moved almost as much by curiosity as by the knowledge that the surest path to shelter and rest was forward, Quatre shook his reins again, and Trowa followed without protest. And soon the looming darkness on either side seemed to rear up to a greater altitude than before, and, indeed, leap solidly over the path; they observed that they were approaching a high, thick hedge-wall through which an arch delved like a tunnel. As they rode closer, the faintest glint of what little light there was showed that metal gates, standing open and unattended, were set inside.

Again Quatre paused, in the shadow of the arch, looking out at the slightly greater brightness - still very faint - of what appeared to be extensive grounds beyond. "This is strange. Should we go in? We can ask to stay the night in their stables, I guess, but where _is_ this?"

Trowa gave the headshake that meant he had no definite opinion on the subject - or at least not one he thought worth voicing - and Quatre sighed. Then he too shook his head, and again rode forward.

Beneath the gated arch, the road changed from dirt (mud, rather) to a fine, well-tended gravel that seemed, even beyond the protection of the hedge, not to have suffered from the heavy rain. Looking around, Quatre could make out very little, but he deemed that they were surrounded by flat stretches of what was probably lawn, and great vertical shapes - decorative hedges, he guessed, delineating gardens, perhaps, and courtyards. Certainly gardens, in fact... the smell of wet roses was heavy on the air. And even in this darkness and uncertainty, such things filled him with bittersweet nostalgia.

The lights they'd been following seemed, somewhat uncannily, to have disappeared. They'd been visible until the very moment Quatre's horse passed under the arch in the hedge-wall, but then it was as if some universal order had gone out through whatever building lay over there in the blackness, and every room had put out its lights at once. It was unnerving, and seemed at odds with the more welcomingly open gates. Still, though, there was little to do but press forward.

No sound reached their ears but the crunch of their horses' hooves on the gravel and the faintest remaining pattering of rain, and Quatre looked around more avidly, even pushing his hood back, seeking some scrap of an indication of where in the world they were, what this place might be. His eyes were brought abruptly back forward, though, when Trowa made a soft, surprised noise.

The road was lined with small lanterns that hung only a few feet off the ground, set at no great interval from each other, but Quatre was only able to see this now because, a few yards ahead of them, one pair was suddenly, unexpectedly aglow. No one was in sight to have lit them; no hint of movement caught his eye. There was simply light where there had been no light before. Then, even as he watched, the next set of lanterns beyond flickered alive, seemingly under their own power.

Yet again Quatre halted his horse, somewhat abruptly this time, and yet again Trowa joined him. They sat staring at the lanterns for several moments in silence - nothing else changed - until finally Trowa reminded him, "We don't really have anywhere else to go right now."

Reluctantly Quatre nodded. It wasn't that there was something inherently wrong about lanterns that lit themselves, or even the implication of magic in the very presence of this uncharted estate in the middle of the forest; it was just that the entire place tasted so much of both the painfully familiar and the unnerving unknown, and the blend was a little uncomfortable. But he forced himself to ride on.

As they approached the first set of glowing lanterns, a third pair lit up ahead of them, and thence with every set they passed another flared up. Glancing around, Quatre noted that those they'd left behind snuffed out immediately once they could no longer be of service. They were being drawn onward by the lights.

The gravel road branched eventually; to the right, it seemed to lead toward the dark face of the great building, whereas the little lit lanterns led to the left. Quatre and Trowa followed them, and soon found themselves, after moving through another hedge arch, in a stableyard that burst abruptly and almost blindingly into light by means of braziers standing in corners and lanterns mounted on the stable walls. Still nobody was in sight, but the stable doors were open, and within it looked invitingly warm and peaceful.

No other horses were taking advantage of any of the numerous stalls, which might have been a surprise, except that, if not for the excellent good repair of the room, the fresh straw on the floor and the feed in the troughs, and the blankets and brushes laid out seemingly specifically for them, the spacious stable might have been devoid even of the _idea_ of horses. Again, therefore, it was with some reluctance that the travelers proceeded, unsaddling, grooming, and blanketing their mounts in discomfort at the silence and emptiness around them. It was certainly warmer, though, and they were thankful to get out of the rain.

When they'd cared adequately for their horses, they sought each other's eyes, wondering what to do next. Hardly had they done so, however, when the lights around them began to dim until only a single lamp at the far end of the stable remained lit. Shouldering their saddle-bags, which they were unwilling to leave behind, they moved together toward it, and observed a door they hadn't previously noticed in a stone wall that was probably one side of the great building.

As they drew near, the door swung noiselessly open in front of them; no one was there to have opened it, but by now Quatre had stopped looking for anyone. He paused, though, before entering the hallway beyond, and put his hand on the wall beside the door.

"I've never seen stone like this," he murmured. "It's sparkling..."

Trowa mimicked his gesture, reaching out to touch the reddish-grey stone and feel its unusual smoothness. He made a noise of agreement, and didn't say what Quatre knew both of them must be thinking: that this place was clearly magical, so why should the stone of which it was built be any different? If either of them had said it aloud, it might have brought up the question of whether a comfortable place to stay was worth the potential risk of this type of accommodation... but as it was, the topic went undebated.

The corridor inside was narrow, obviously a servant's path. It was also pitch black in either direction, once the heavy wooden door closed behind them, except for the pool of light in which they now stood that fell from the ensconced candles on the walls to either side. This didn't last long, however, as with a gentle flicker another set of candles a few feet off to their left came to light. Taking this as a sign that they were to move in that direction, they complied.

As outside on the gravel, the lights drew them onward, springing into life ahead to direct their steps and falling back into nothingness behind them. Up a narrow staircase and around a corner they were led, then through a door onto a landing that overlooked a vast empty space they could make little of in the darkness.

Quatre, smelling the old familiar scents of rich cloth and fine wood along with the ever-present rose essence, moved across a thick mahogany-colored carpet to a carved stone railing, looking out and trying to distinguish the shape of the room they were now in - but the light of the only two candles currently lit fell far short of piercing the great black space; he could see nothing but faint hints of luminance, which delineated nothing, several yards in front of him. The lights were beckoning them anyway, so he tore himself away from what he could not see and followed.

Doors were set at regular intervals beside them as they walked, visible one by one in the shifting light of the candles. Between these hung, from high above up near the unseen ceiling, great swaths of velvet of a deep wine color, helping to protect this great room or hallway from drafts. Quatre still wished he could better divine its shape; he could almost feel the expanse of the darkness out beyond his arm's reach. He imagined all the rooms in this strange palace brightly lit until the moment two weary, soaking wet travelers arrived - drawing them through the forest, enticing them here, and then plunging into blackness so they could be guided by these few candles down a single, linear path.

The latter ended at one of the doors, which swung slowly, silently open as they approached. They entered a very comfortable-looking parlor, close but not stifling, hung with burgundy and gold and furnished in ebony. Quatre's eyes ran over a venerable stone fireplace on whose hearth a cheerful fire crackled, already warming his chilled skin; divans piled with great fat pillows covered in velvet; a small dark table with two chairs, their curving legs and backs elegantly carved and shining; and, probably most delightful of all at the moment, two translucent screens in the far corners, behind one of which he could see from this angle a wooden stand that held a basin of steaming water.

With a grateful noise he dropped the saddle-bag he'd been carrying against the wall, heedless of how its dirty wet state might affect the carpet on which it slumped, and pressed forward to the first screen. "I don't know what this place is," he said, "but it knows how to treat a muddy traveler." Trowa gave a brief syllable of agreement, and Quatre heard his footsteps making for the other corner.

There was more than just water: a sea sponge, a comb, an oil for the skin, a stack of thick towels, a long embroidered robe, and a pair of luxurious bedroom slippers all waited behind the screen, and Quatre did not dawdle in making use of them. The water was deliciously hot, the oil smelled of roses, and the sponge was soft and efficient; he didn't think he'd ever been so glad to get out of wet clothes and wash up in as long as he could remember.

Presently Trowa, from his corner, asked, "Do you smell something?"

Quatre raised his head and scented the air. "Besides roses?"

"Yes. Something more like onions."

Trowa's matter-of-factness even when he didn't seem entirely certain had always amused and pleased Quatre; and, now that Trowa mentioned it, Quatre thought he _did_ smell something that might be onions. It mingled oddly with the rose scent, and, in addition to piquing his curiosity, made his stomach abruptly rumble with hunger. He hastened to finish his toilette and throw on the robe and slippers; then, leaving his wet things draped over an ebony clothes-horse that stood beside the stand and his muddy boots just beneath it, he stepped out into the room again.

The little table was now set for two: a pair of shining, cream-colored china plates edged with gold and two crystal drinking glasses separated by a number of covered silver dishes from which steam rose invitingly.

"It looks like they're feeding us too," he murmured as he drew closer.

Trowa, wearing a robe just like his, soon joined him in looking down at the little table and its intimate supper arrangement. "Do you think it's safe to eat?"

Quatre shifted. "I'm not sure. I want to say yes... I don't know why they'd go to all this trouble just to poison us..."

A slight frown touched Trowa's usually impassive face. "Some stories talk about travelers being trapped in a magical place forever once they'd eaten the food."

"Do you really believe in things like that, though?"

"As much as I believe in mysterious palaces no one's ever heard of, or lights that light themselves, or suppers appearing out of nowhere."

"I think..." Slowly Quatre moved toward one of the chairs, reached out and ran a finger along one of the carved grooves in its back. "I think I'm going to chance it." Before he could come any closer, however, Trowa stepped swiftly past him and pulled the chair out. Quatre smiled up at him as he took his seat. "You haven't done that in years."

"It reminds me of the old estate," Trowa replied, with a quirk at the corner of his lips.

Quatre watched him move to the other chair and sit down, then looked around again briefly at the rich furnishings of a room he was certain was only one of many, many richly furnished chambers. "Our house was nowhere near this fine," he said softly, a little sadly. "But I guess I can pretend I'm rich again for one night. Since it seems pretty obvious we're welcome to stay the night - and not in the stable, either."

The little hint of Trowa's smile turned wan, and he nodded.

"And hopefully tomorrow we can find the right road," Quatre went on, turning his attention toward the steaming dishes on the table. He lifted the lid from one of them and peered in. "It didn't _seem_ like we passed any other crossings or forks after the one where we took the wrong turn, but it was too dark to be sure."

Trowa nodded again. "Is that roast goose?"

"That's what it looks like..."

They had goose with onions and garlic; tart apples and carrots in a hot sweet sauce; light, flaky biscuits to mop up the goose fat; a rich dark cake with cream between its layers; and a deep purple wine from some unfamiliar fruit that complemented everything superbly. Every smell was intoxicating; every flavor was amazing; it was without question the best meal either of them had eaten in years - possibly the best they'd ever had in their lives. Quatre didn't think there could be any question that magic had been involved in the making of it, and it finished what the fire and hot water and change of clothing had started in rendering him quite content, at least physically.

He was also rather drowsy, and, looking across the little table at Trowa, thought his companion felt the same. Around the room then his glance swept again, to the velvet-covered, well-pillowed divans. "Are we meant to sleep in here, do you think?"

Trowa had barely begun to follow his gaze when the lights in the room - candles ensconced in glass on the walls and the fire in the hearth alike - began to dim. "I think not," he said.

Quatre laughed a little, and rose from his chair. "Actually I'm looking forward to whatever kind of beds they have here. They must be nice." Rising more slowly, Trowa nodded, and together they left the room.

Led once more by light, they moved again through the great dark space and into a more enclosed corridor, which ran up a wide, carpeted flight of stairs to another hallway. Quatre hoped the lights really _were_ guiding them to beds where they could sleep the night, for he found himself yawning, and the body-wide ache from all the time he'd spent in the saddle lately - a pastime to which he was no longer accustomed - was asserting itself as it usually did at about this time of night.

Fortunately, they didn't have far to go. The doors in this third-floor hallway were painted white and set into white frames, and now a pair of them, each flanked by golden-glowing candles, opened noiselessly at the travelers' approach. The rooms beyond, springing into light as they moved closer, were clearly bedchambers, hung like the other rooms they'd seen in rich, noise-dampening cloths and furnished in fine ebony.

Quatre, stepping to one of the doors, eyed the dark hangings and tall posts of the bed greedily. "This looks wonderful." He paused in the doorway, and turned to Trowa. "If we _are_ stuck here after eating that supper... well, I can think of worse places to be trapped forever."

He was joking, of course, and Trowa knew it. With a faint smile, "Good night," Trowa said, and turned toward his own door.

Echoing the good night, Quatre entered his room and looked around. The wood-paneled walls were painted white to offset the dark hangings, and gold moulding gleamed along the juncture of wall and ceiling. The only stone visible in the room was a small fireplace, again with fire already burning cheerfully, again carved in intricate scrollwork to match the moulding and the posts of the bed and the heavy chair that stood beside another door in a side wall.

On the wooden mantle set into the stone there stood a row of delicate porcelain animals touched with fine gilding, and Quatre spent several enchanted, breathless moments examining these before turning completely around to face a window that looked out over the palace grounds. Long burgundy curtains were pulled back from the glass with ropes of gold, baring the dark expanse of lawns, gardens, and hedges hardly visible below in the light of what stars showed through the slowly breaking cloud.

Laid out neatly on the bed was a set of sleepwear - a short, sleeveless nightshift and knee-length drawers, both of a soft, cream-colored linen - and this Quatre donned as soon as he noticed it. He put the long robe over the top again, however, and, though he pulled at the covers of the bed, did not lie down. Instead, he wandered back to the window.

A strange silence was growing in the room, over the dark grounds without, and even over the scattering of stars above, untouched by the rustlings his clothing made or the sound of his breathing. It intensified as he laid his face on the cool window-pane and strained to gather more detail of the view. The wet lawns gleamed very faintly in the starlight, and he thought he could make out where the grounds ended and the boundless shadow of the forest began, but more specificity than this he could not attain. And the silence grew. It lay over everything he could see or thought he could see like the rain's cool moisture, and everything here in the room much like the fire's warmth.

It was a waiting silence. A tired silence. A silence that asked nothing of him, merely regarded him through half-open eyes and wondered without really caring whether he would be the one. What was this place? What was it waiting for? Why was it full of this subtle weariness that you didn't notice until you were alone with it, listening for it? For Quatre hadn't felt any of this when Trowa was with him. Their goodnights just out there in the hallway suddenly seemed long ago and far away. And now he was alone with the palace... the sad, silent palace...

Brows drawing together, Quatre turned away from the window. As he slowly shed his robe, tossing it onto the chair, and stepped out of his slippers, kneeling into the bed, he seemed to feel sleep calling him more even than it had any night over the last two weary weeks. He stretched out under the covers, feeling a warm spot down by his feet as if a servant had placed a warmer there and only just removed it; he hadn't felt that in a long time. Then, as he settled back onto the pillows and reached up to pull at the curtain tie, the candles on the walls began to dim.

"You've very attentive," he murmured, to nothing, to whoever or whatever was here looking after him. "Thank you." When his mouth closed after these words, however, he felt he'd done little to break the silence.

In the darkness behind the bed-curtains he closed his eyes, enjoying a softness of pillow and mattress and a smoothness of sheets that he hadn't experienced in ages. But he found almost immediately that sleep was going to be more difficult than he'd thought. The silence seemed to weigh on him like something heavy and wet - like the storm, though without the turmoil of lightning and thunder. Like a cloud, perhaps. Still it demanded nothing of him, but it was ever-present; he could not shake it.

The little private space within the curtains was comfortable and warm, and yet a chill began to steal over Quatre as he lay quietly in the darkness. It was not necessarily physical, but it made him shiver nonetheless. All the lights and solicitude and richness of this place, it seemed, were not enough to erase or cover this forlorn silence, this uncanny stillness that seeped in to the level of bone.

He sat up. He pushed the bed-curtain aside and stood. The carpet was cool under his bare feet, but he didn't bother seeking out his slippers again. He moved to the window once more, finding as he did so that its curtains had been closed by invisible hands while he attempted to sleep. With one of them pulled back, he looked out over the darkness of the palace grounds, feeling as if he was searching for something he could not at the moment identify and did not know how to anticipate. Like the rest of the palace, he was waiting in silence.

When it came, he didn't even know whether or not he'd really seen it: movement on the grass below. It was nothing more than a brief shifting, and he might well have imagined it, but it seemed as if a bulky figure had crossed one of the spaces of lesser darkness, trailing a shadow behind it that was not human but matched no animal whose shape Quatre might have expected to see in such a place as this.

But, then, what _should_ he expect to see in such a place as this?

He shivered, and pulled abruptly away from the window again. Turning, he looked around helplessly at the pitch blackness of the room, until obligingly a single candle put up a soft, low flame. "Thank you," he murmured, and moved immediately toward the door in the side wall - the door that should lead into the bedroom Trowa was occupying.

Candle flame rose gently there too as soon as he entered, and a hand, ghostly in the low light, pulled aside one of the curtains on the bed as soon as Trowa heard him. "Quatre?" came Trowa's voice from beyond it. "What's wrong?"

"Is it all right if I sleep with you?" Quatre stepped into the room and quietly closed the door.

"Of course." There was the sound of shifting as Trowa moved to make room for him in the bed, though the latter was plenty large enough for two people already - certainly bigger than the bed they shared at home.

Once Quatre lay safely behind closed curtains, the candle went out, and total darkness reigned as he put his back against Trowa's and settled into the pillows.

"What's wrong?" Trowa asked again, softly.

Quatre sighed. "I don't know. Something about this place... I thought it was warm and welcoming with all its magical lights and fires in the fireplaces and making us supper... and I think it's _trying_ to be... but underneath that, as soon as you can hear it, it's _so sad_."

"Yes," Trowa agreed quietly.

"It's so quiet and... and _lonely_... and I feel like it's waiting for something... Like it's been waiting for a very long time..." Even more softly Quatre wondered, "Do you think it's dangerous?"

"Only if _we're_ what it's been waiting for."

"Well..." Quatre tried for the same levity he'd used outside in the hallway. "Like I said, there are worse places to be trapped forever."

Out of the darkness came Trowa's brief, sardonic laugh. "I guess we'll see tomorrow, when we try to leave."

"At least we'll have an interesting story to tell everyone at home. Better than the one we're already bringing, anyway..."

Trowa made a noise of agreement, and then they both fell silent. And whether it was Trowa's presence that helped to stave off the unnerving silence and sense of loneliness and longing that still hung in the air, or whether discussing it had helped, Quatre now found himself drifting toward sleep with a certainty he felt about little else at the moment.

...

...

...

When Darl, the carpenter's son, came into the little room at the back of the shop where Heero, the carpenter's assistant, slept, it was guaranteed to prove a nuisance to Heero. He only ever came in here to try to prod Heero into doing something Heero had no interest in doing - usually because one of his regular friends had bailed at the last minute and Darl felt the need of an even number to go drink at the inn or something.

Heero was somewhat idly whittling at a nice piece of mountain ash using the last of the day's light, listening to the sounds of the forest through an open window, and deliberately did not look up when Darl entered. Perhaps if he ignored him completely, Darl might get the message a little sooner this time.

"Aren't you going to the festival?" was how Darl opened the conversation. He sounded baffled.

Although Heero had the day off tomorrow - as did most of the community - he'd largely forgotten about the festival up at the square since he hadn't, in fact, been planning on attending.

"I just came to see if you wanted to walk up there with us tonight," Darl went on. "We're going to camp the night on the field. But you weren't even planning on going, were you?"

Heero continued not to look at him, and still said nothing.

"Everyone's gonna think you're really strange for this one, you know." Darl's tone was one of warning, and somewhat petulant. "_I_ already know you're really strange, but everyone else thinks you're just 'a sober, responsible young man.' But you'll offend people and they'll start giving you strange looks if you don't go to the festival. _Everyone_ goes to the festival. People come from up the mountain and out as far as Asgon; it's just the only way you'll ever get to meet half the girls in the area! And there's cheap food and beer, and games and dancing, and..." He trailed off when it was evident that his words weren't making the slightest impression on Heero. "God, fine," he added in exasperation. "Just sit around here all day tomorrow carving your stupid carvings, and we'll all just have fun without you." And he closed the door rather vigorously as he left.

Outwardly placid, Heero continued carving as bidden, but he was actually a little annoyed. Something about Darl had always irked him, since the day Heero had met him two months back when he'd first come here, and it wasn't only that Darl was about a hundred times more socially inclined than Heero would ever be. And the truth was, his words just now _had_ made an impression. Only the slightest impression, but an impression nonetheless.

Darl wasn't the best source for any accurate account of an event - especially given that, the moment beer was involved, all other details seemed to haze right over for him - but Heero had heard the festival described by other sources, and it didn't sound _too_ bad. There was no law, after all, stating that he was required to talk to anyone there, and he liked seeing people happy when he didn't have to be actively involved. And cheap food was always nice, and he had to admit to some interest in the colored lanterns they reputedly hung up every year that were supposedly worth seeing. He wouldn't be paid for tomorrow in any event, since it had never crossed Alan's mind that Heero might not be interested in the day off...

One thing he would certainly _not_ do, however, was walk up there with Darl Carpenter and his rowdy friends and spend the night in a field.

He kept thinking about it until he went to bed, and eventually decided that, if he still felt any sort of interest in the morning, he would leave then. He usually rose fairly early, and could get there in good time; and since it was highly unlikely that he would be tempted to stay particularly late into the evening, he could be back here fairly early tomorrow night too. It shouldn't disrupt his routine much at all.

How wrong he was about that.

The festival's purpose was to welcome spring. Heero had arrived in the mountain community in winter, and didn't yet know what spring here was like, but he was already accustomed to the chilly, misty mornings that were typical of its onset. It was perfect weather for walking, and nothing better to do (unpaid) came to mind, so he set off for the much-talked-of festival with his usual restrained but purposeful stride.

This area, not precisely being a _town_ of any description, had a number of names. The adjacent mountain was generally agreed upon as 'Mount Rubiset,' so that figured into most of the various titles the inhabitants gave the region, and just 'Rubiset' was how Heero referred to his new home when he was required to talk about it at all (which didn't happen often). Then 'the square' was what the various far-flung inhabitants of the region called an almost town-like (in their estimation) cluster of buildings that lay a few miles north of the carpenter's house, and it was there that the annual festival was held.

Celebration was already underway when Heero arrived. Darl had gotten some things right, at least: _everyone_, young and old, came to the festival, from every distant corner of the region; Heero hadn't seen a tenth so many people together since leaving his hometown (which had been an actual town) months before.

They were all selling everything they normally sold, but now there wasn't nearly so long a walk to get at some of it; Heero reflected, observing this, that if he needed to buy anything from any tradesman in the area, now would be the most convenient time. They had set up stalls around the field and the buildings of the square, or just spread their wares out on blankets, and were shouting cheerfully at each other and at passersby.

Anyone with a talent showcased it today: singers, dancers, jugglers, acrobats - all of them self-taught amateurs, of course, since those that left Rubiset to learn such things in earnest rarely returned; they did what they could to the best of their ability and then passed their hats around. And those with craftier talents that tended toward the creation of items with more interest and beauty than usefulness found a venue to sell or at least display the fruits of their labors.

A lot of food was available, much of it the type of festival fare nobody ever bothered to make if it wasn't a special occasion. That alone might have made the trip worth it if Heero had felt like spending money rather than just frugally lunching on some bread and cheese he'd brought from home. He still rather liked the pleasant smells, though, and the sight of all the colorful blankets and the painted stands.

The most that could be said of the lanterns at this point was that they were numerous. They were strung all across the field and between the corners of the buildings in the square, the sturdy clotheslines that held them neatly arranged in some places and inelegantly criss-crossed in others. The lanterns themselves were of all shapes and sizes and colors; some had probably been purchased in far-off towns especially for this occasion, but most, he knew, had been brought from all over the area by the people that had made them at home, probably after having kept their eyes open the whole year for the perfect paper with which to do so. This added a sort of local charm, but still they weren't much to look at while the sun was up.

Beer was, as Darl had indicated, plentiful and cheap. Unfortunately, Heero was not fond of beer, nor of the way it made people behave. In fact, as the day progressed and the various formal and informal games being played around the square became rowdier, and the general jollity reached a pitch more irritating than pleasant, his patience and ability to tolerate people waned more and more quickly, and he rather blamed it on the drink.

He'd been leaning against the rear wall of one of the buildings looking out into the field for a while, and was feeling a little stiff and decidedly tired of being here, by the time the sun began to set. It had been somewhat interesting at first, but eventually he'd only still stuck around because he felt it would be a shame to come all this way and stay all this time without seeing the lanterns lit. Of course they would probably be disappointing, but that had been half the point of the trip in the first place and he wasn't going to miss it. At least this way he could say he'd seen them, and then next year he wouldn't be tempted to waste his time.

They waited until the orange of sunset had faded and the blue shadows were stretching and it had begun to darken in earnest before they brought out ladders and began - in a somewhat haphazard and disorganized fashion, Heero thought - to light the little candles inside the paper lanterns. Heero wondered how long they would burn, and whether they ever caught fire.

And it turned out that they _were_ something worth looking at - or at least, worth a walk of only a couple of miles once a year or so; farther, more frequently, perhaps not so much. But the way their colorful translucent paper cast odd light in various hues on the ground and the faces looking up was fascinating to observe, and by the time they were all lit, the square and the field glowed like a luminous garden from a dream.

Some of the people on the blankets and at the stalls lit lanterns of their own then - theirs mostly white, though it did little to pierce the almost confusing jumble of other colors - but some of them shut down for the evening in order to join in the revelry themselves. As Heero began slowly making his way across the field, headed generally in the direction of home now that he'd seen what he'd come for, he heard music start up at the other end and a cheer rise from the people clustered there. Evidently the dancing was now to begin, and evidently this was what many of the _others_ had come for.

Somewhat to his surprise, Heero was asked three times to dance before he'd even reached the area where this activity was being carried out. Two of the girls he recognized - they lived near the carpenter, and he'd seen one in the shop, though he couldn't remember either of their names - but the third was a stranger that blushed furiously as she introduced herself. He was as polite as he could manage in refusing them with the excuse that he didn't intend to dance and was, in fact, leaving; but they all - the third in particular - seemed disproportionately crestfallen at his answer.

When he reached a spot where he could cut between two lighted stalls and leave the field all together, he paused and glanced around. This was the eastern end, and he was closer to the dancers here, so he might as well take a look at them. And in doing so, he came quickly to the opinion that, even if he'd wanted to dance, he could never have done it; he would only have disappointed those girls. Something slower, perhaps, he could have managed, but this tune, though he enjoyed the brisk sounds of flute and fiddle and drum, was too quick. He could never have matched the vigorous movements of those that followed it.

Something drew him a few steps closer as the clapping, cheerful ring of people watching the dancers shifted a little and gave him a better view. And there... and there...

He didn't know what it was about the man he'd caught sight of dancing out there - dancing, in fact, with the third, the most emotional girl Heero had turned down - but somehow, once Heero had seen him, he couldn't tear his eyes away. It was odd, because, though the stranger _did_ look somewhat interesting, there was nothing about him that Heero would have considered, before, particularly riveting. But now as Heero watched, he felt unexpectedly and almost frighteningly agitated by the sight - his heart pounded hard against his ribs, and his skin flushed until he was certain he must be as bright a red as that girl had been when she'd asked him to dance.

She was falling rather behind now, and the energy of her partner that thus baffled her efforts was probably what had initially drawn Heero's attention. The man danced with an enthusiasm that seemed almost wild, his intense movements just a touch exaggerated and as a consequence almost comical - and yet they were so concise, somehow, that it could not but be deliberate. The purpose and directness of his motion was not what most would have called 'graceful,' and yet seemed so well suited to his intentions as to become something much the same.

As the man whirled and spun the girl around with him, Heero was surprised to see a priest's hood attached to the back of his tunic. Exactly why this should be surprising he didn't know, but for several seconds he stared at it every time it returned to view. Heero hadn't attended church a single time since he'd come to Rubiset, since it met here in the square and two and a half miles seemed to him a little too far to walk for something he really didn't care much about... but it occurred to him now, all of a sudden, that it probably wouldn't kill him to come up for services on occasion. Once a week? Was that really so often?

The man's face was very handsome, in a pleasant, rugged sort of way, even dappled as it currently was with variegated patches of light. And that same light made it difficult to determine the exact hue of his hair, but Heero, pushing slowly ever closer through the happy crowd, guessed it to be a brown a few shades lighter than his own. It was very long - longer than most womens' - and pulled back into a thick, somewhat messy-looking braid that bounced and curled around him as he moved. Heero gave it a few moments' consideration before turning his eyes back to the face.

The most fascinating thing about this man was not his features. It was that indefinable _something_ that wouldn't allow Heero to look away from him - a glamour of some type, it seemed, that made him more interesting than anyone Heero had seen at this festival or perhaps anywhere else. The man was simply wonderful to watch, and something about him suggested that he would be wonderful to talk to as well, wonderful to have around. Heero wanted... he didn't know what. He wanted to join him in the dance, which was grossly unprecedented, but at the same time he wanted to drag him out of the dance and take him off somewhere private and... he didn't know what. Have him all to himself, he supposed.

It was the oddest impulse he'd ever felt. He'd never been social, or even particularly friendly, so why did he suddenly desire that man's friendship more than he'd wanted anything in a very long time? What could it possibly be about the stranger that was so compelling, so overwhelmingly desirable? Why did it make Heero's heart throb like this? And was he likely ever to find out?

"Heero? Heero! It's really you; I didn't think it could be! What's this about, making me think you weren't coming and now you're just here?"

Darl was annoying, but at the moment Heero was pleased to see him, since he might prove useful in this instance. "Who's that man?" he asked without preamble. "That one out there dancing. With the braid."

Though he seemed a trifle inebriated, Darl followed Heero's gesture with his eyes and stared for a moment. "Um, I think..." He thought again; it looked like hard going. "I think he lives up at the old church - you know there's an old church just up at the other end, right? I can't remember his name, though."

When locals said 'at the other end,' they meant 'somewhere in the opposite direction.' The carpenter lived in what might be called the southeastern corner of Rubiset, so this second church - of which Heero had never heard - must be to the northwest. He shouldn't have any trouble finding it. He also didn't mind that Darl didn't know the stranger's name, since he'd rather hear it first from the stranger himself.

He nodded his thanks to Darl, but the gesture was somewhat absent; he'd already mostly forgotten the carpenter's son was there, in fact almost forgotten that he existed... he and the rest of the world, except for that man with the braid dancing like a wild thing out there under the colored lights.


	2. Chapter 2

This level of comfort was something Trowa was no longer accustomed to. Indeed, even back during the good times, he, as a servant, had never slept in a bed _this_ soft, never awakened in such perfect contentment. The only thing familiar about this arrangement was the presence of Quatre beside him, back-to-back with him, sharing the warmth of his body and the spaciousness of the bed.

Not wanting to wake him, Trowa lay still and silent, concentrating on that contact between them. They'd been sharing a bed for almost three years now, ever since the luxury of separate beds had been stripped from them along with everything else, and this was the closest he ever was to Quatre. He had quickly managed to repress every urge toward further closeness, and now could easily lie here without being overcome by the temptation to turn and run hands over his master's body and lips over his master's face and neck. There was rarely a day when he woke up without the thought of it, though, even in surroundings as strange as these.

The surroundings, however, soon came to ascendency. A dim, hazy light filtered through various cracks between curtains, coloring everything a faint, sunrise red, but what time of morning it actually was Trowa could not guess. They had probably slept late, tired as they'd both been from exertion, disappointment, and wonder; he wondered how this would set them back on their journey home. Granted, they weren't expected at any particular time, but he knew Quatre was anxious to get there, bad news or no bad news.

He found himself exceptionally curious about this place. Everything Quatre had said last night rang true in Trowa's ears; the rooms and corridors echoed of loneliness and silence, of waiting, of sadness... Quatre had also joked that there were worse places to be trapped forever, but Trowa couldn't see his master stuck in a place like this. Surely it would sap him of all the happiness he had left and wither him like a plucked flower.

At his side Quatre stirred, and Trowa moved away from him and sat up, leaning on one hand and watching. A little blearily Quatre opened his eyes, looked around slowly. "Trowa?" he mumbled. "Where are we?"

"A mysterious lonely palace in the middle of the forest," Trowa reminded him.

"Oh." Quatre sat up as well, pushing the blanket aside, and yawned. "I had the strangest dreams..."

"So did I," Trowa admitted. Actually he hadn't remembered until Quatre spoke, but now the images came trickling back - images of faces, of feelings, of festival lights... but they were quickly fading, and he had better things to do than hold onto them.

Quatre sighed, and already Trowa thought there was in it just a touch of the age-old sadness of this place. They needed to get out of here.

"We need to get out of here," Quatre said. "We've been away from home too long already."

Glad they agreed on this, Trowa nodded. He took a breath to reply, but as he did so caught once again, mingling with the scent of roses that seemed to be everywhere here, the smell of something distinctly edible. "Do you smell that?" he said instead of what he'd been planning on.

And Quatre, instead of answering, swiveled his legs out from under the blanket, pushed through the bed-curtains, and stood up out of Trowa's sight. "It's breakfast," he reported. "I can't say I'm surprised."

"No," Trowa agreed, shifting from the bed as well, over the warm spot left by Quatre's body and out the curtains.

A door Trowa hadn't bothered inspecting last night, opposite the one that opened onto the room Quatre had so briefly used, stood open now, and beyond it was another bright, richly decorated little parlor into which Quatre was pointing. The tantalizing smell of bacon and potatoes clearly wafted thence, and the two men made their way in without delay. Before either one, however, took a seat at the little ebony table identical to the one on which they'd supped last night, they were both drawn to the window.

The curtains were pulled back, and a clean morning light, such as often occurred after a heavy rain, blazed into the room. The window looked east, straight into the sun and out over the luminous grounds that could now (excepting the glare) be made out with ease. Trowa gazed down wordlessly on regular lawns and gardens and the great hedges that divided them, on fountains and a gazebo, on curling lanes and little tiled pavements; he'd never seen anything like it. He'd been once or twice to the grounds of the royal palace in Silbreaker, but it had scarcely been so fine, so exquisitely designed and perfectly maintained as this.

"Amazing," Quatre breathed at his side. "It's so beautiful."

And lonelier than ever, from here. Trowa turned away, back toward their breakfast table.

They had bacon and potato slices and fresh fruit, with a lighter wine this time, and again everything was superb. Trowa was not ashamed of eating as much as he could of this spectacular food while he had the chance, before he went back to the poor and strictly rationed fare of home... and perhaps worse.

"Do you know what I've just realized?" Quatre remarked as they were about finished. "We left our bags in that other room last night. _And_ all our clothing."

"Let's hope the palace isn't trying to rob us of our valuable possessions," replied Trowa dryly.

Quatre smiled. "Well, at least I hope it'll lead us back there to pick those things up; I wouldn't like to have to add to the news we're already bringing that we lost all our belongings along the way."

"Especially since the saddle-bags don't belong to us," Trowa agreed. He sat still for a long moment, contemplating in silence, before he realized that he was staring at the way the morning light through the tall window made Quatre's hair blaze like platinum. Then he stood abruptly from his chair and turned back toward the bedroom.

There, he found all of the clothes he'd been wearing yesterday, cleaned and pressed, folded neatly on the bed - which had itself been made up and its curtains tied back to let in the light and fresh air. His boots, looking cleaner than he'd ever seen them, stood on the floor beside the bed, and he stared down at them for a long moment.

Presently Quatre joined him. "I think that's a good sign," he said thoughtfully. "If the palace wanted to keep us forever, it would probably give us new clothing."

Just a little cynically Trowa asked, "Have you looked in the wardrobe?"

"No; why?"

Trowa shrugged. He'd only glanced briefly in his last night, but everything he'd seen inside had seemed like something he could wear.

"Hmm..." Quatre headed into the next bedroom through the door between, which still stood open. "My things are in here too," he reported.

Trowa began pulling off his nightshift and drawers. His clothing, he found, had been washed in something that left it relatively soft and smelling faintly, predictably, of roses; and a fraying little hole in the knee of his trousers had also been neatly mended. He stood fingering the spot for a few moments, reflecting on the minute thoughtfulness of whatever power was behind this place. This he appreciated almost more than the excellent meals or even the good night's rest; he only owned two pairs of trousers in the world, after all.

Soon Quatre, fully clothed in the rough, simple garments, similar to Trowa's, that were all the family could afford these days, rejoined him in his room and moved to gaze pensively out the window. Trowa finished lacing up his boots and went to stand by him. The sun, having risen further since they'd last looked, was a little less blinding now, and they stared down at the grounds again in undiminished wonder. The hedges, Trowa was noticing, were dotted with myriad colors, as if they were covered improbably with innumerable bright flowers of every conceivable hue.

"Roses," he said suddenly, realizing.

"I think the gardens are full of them," Quatre nodded. "That's where the smell comes from."

"Let's go," said Trowa softly, not liking the touch of loneliness that sounded once again in Quatre's voice.

Again Quatre nodded, and turned away from the glass.

They were able to see the hall outside the bedrooms quite clearly now. High up on the walls above the level of the bedroom ceilings, windows opened out eastward and spilled the light of morning into the corridor, making the deep red and gold hangings shine and glitter and eliminating the need for candles. A few of the latter were lit, however, on the wall opposite the door they had just exited, and as they moved toward them, new lights sprang up further down, guiding them just as they had last night.

Quatre was gazing around in undisguised wonder and perhaps a little covetousness as they moved again through the halls of the quiet palace. Trowa knew he missed the days when this type of luxury hadn't been nearly as foreign to him as it was now; he wished there was something he could do to give that back. He watched the soft blue eyes dart here and there, taking in every detail of stone carving, wood paneling, deep carpet, and rich hanging, and wished he could give him all of this.

After descending a flight of stairs, the hallway led onto the railinged landing Quatre had evidently been so curious about last night, and even Trowa could not help but be interested in the room they now entered. The landing stretched like a balcony the full length of a huge entry hall, and split off at the middle into a great double curved staircase leading down to the ground floor and the massive doors that were undoubtedly the main entrance into the palace. The room itself encompassed two stories, and its front face was filled with enormous, floor-to-ceiling windows that currently let in the brilliant light of morning and the view of one of the beautiful fountains they'd seen from above.

The leading lights were suddenly nowhere to be seen, but it didn't matter since the travelers, compelled by interest, were advancing along the landing to where it lowered to a sort of dais at the head of the grand staircase. Trowa was gazing intently, as he walked alongside Quatre, at the two marble statues that stood on the ground level, each just beyond the elaborate stone banister posts, centered in the outer two thirds of the room.

They were of a man and woman, beautifully carved in intricate, flowing detail full of motion and life, though much larger than life, and they stared at each other across the great room with such hopeless longing in their stone faces that Trowa thought they alone could almost represent the source of all the sadness of this place. They sparkled faintly in the sunlight.

"I think a very lonely faery must live here," Quatre murmured as they reached the bottom of the curving steps.

Trowa, nodding, was still looking around. He noted that there was a long fireplace, the size of a small room, set into the underside of the stairs they'd just traversed, and he found himself wondering a little absently - besides whether such a thing helped at all to warm this giant hall, with its great expanses of glass and its marble statues, in cold weather - where the smoke went.

"Look," Quatre said suddenly, seizing Trowa's shoulder and pointing out through the great open front doors. Trowa, obeying, saw, past the fountain, past the tiled courtyard in which the latter stood, out on the gravel road where it looped around before the palace entry, their horses, saddled and ready for riding, placidly standing. "I guess we're allowed to leave," Quatre whispered.

Again Trowa nodded.

As they began making their way toward the animals, Quatre remarked in the same quiet tone as before, "I wish there was some way we could repay whoever is behind all of this for their kindness."

"We'd originally intended to pay two copper coins to sleep in a woodcutter's barn," Trowa said. "We can't afford much more than that."

"But I wish there was something we could do."

Lips pursed, Trowa nodded.

The fountain was of the same marble as the statues in the entry hall, and its high-rising water cascaded back down with a musical sound and sent out a fine mist like the chilly beginning of a soft rainfall to dampen their cheeks as they passed. Set in an abstract pattern that swirled around the fountain and confused the eye if followed, the tiles beneath their feet were red and brown and white. The entire area was partially enclosed by some of the great, thick, omnipresent hedges, which Trowa could more easily see from here were, in fact, swarming with roses in every color of the rainbow.

Their horses looked up and greeted them placidly when they reached the edge of the tiles, and here by mutual consent they stopped and glanced back. And it was then quite some time before they could tear their eyes away.

Sparkling reddish-grey, windows gleaming, the palace rose asymmetrically to a towering head at least six storeys above; and though its front face receded so that some of the higher levels must be considerably smaller than the massive ground floor appeared to be, still the structure was so big that it filled their entire vision. The stonework was touched here and there with elegant carvings, and they could make out balconies high up where they had not ventured when they'd been inside.

The sunlight glittering on the flying water of the fountain in front of them and the many windows of the palace's face shone white and beautiful, but Trowa couldn't help thinking that even this - even the bright, warm, untouchable light of the sun - was filled with the same almost unbearable loneliness that saturated everything else. He would not grieve at seeing the last of this place.

Quatre evidently didn't feel like mounting and riding just yet, for he took the reins and pulled them around so as to guide his horse on foot. Trowa, though he would have preferred a speedier departure, followed his lead. They walked down the gravel road, their steps crunching along with their horses', and Trowa noticed that even the tiny white stones that made up this ground beneath them seemed to have a sparkle to them, as if they were semi-precious.

The road was flanked by long stretches of lawn broken only by little tiled paths that led beyond into the gardens and courtyards and an orchard of sorts. The thick hedges neatly separated all of these and threw the scent of roses heavily into the air; the outer hedge, though taller and wider than the others, was no different in its decoration, and Trowa marveled, as they came nearer to it, at the variety of color and stages of blossom of the roses: from the tightest bud to the widest, most vibrant flower.

Inside the deep entry arch, as before, the gates stood open, ready for them to pass. And once again, before they could step into the shadows, off the gravel road and into the forest, Quatre paused and turned back.

"I don't know what to think of this place," he murmured. "I've never seen anything like it, and I'm sure I never will again." And he swept a slow gaze across the grounds and the now- distant face of the palace.

Although Trowa agreed, he knew also that Quatre had been more touched by the strange place than he had. That was entirely typical, of course... Quatre's impossibly open heart was always more responsive to everything than anyone else's; of course the mystery and pathos had affected him more deeply than it had Trowa.

While Quatre took his long last look, Trowa turned toward something that had caught his attention as they approached the arch: one particular rose, just above his head, growing on the hedge-wall near the exit, that seemed - that was - very precisely the same shade of pale blue-grey as Quatre's eyes.

Releasing his horse and moving toward the hedge, Trowa reached up into the tangle of leaves and branches, and felt the immediate sharp prick of thorns on his fingers. Rethinking, he brought out the nail-knife he kept in his pocket and, unsheathing it, reached up again with more care. It wasn't without some further pricking and scratching that he cut the rose free from the hedge, but he brought it down with some satisfaction and began stripping the thorns off. When he was finished with this task, he returned to Quatre's side, where he wordlessly offered the great blue flower to his master.

Quatre's breath caught as he saw the size and impossible color of the rose. "Thank you," he said almost inaudibly, taking the gift gently and staring down at it, the reflection of it in his eyes seeming to disappear, so similar were the colors. He didn't understand the gesture, of course; he never did. But he obviously appreciated it all the same. He bent to smell it, and then, with a smile, threaded the short, thornless stem through his top few buttonholes. "Now I can take something of this place with me," he added at a murmur.

Trowa nodded. "Let's go."

Quatre, agreeing, turned and sought absently for his horse's reins, which he'd dropped in looking out at the palace that one last time. Trowa did the same, and they headed again toward the arch in the hedge.

But the gates were now closed.

Concern and uneasiness abruptly filling him, Trowa advanced right up to the intricate metal bars, and noted that 'gates' was - at least at the moment - not precisely the right term. 'Wall' might have been better, as there was no juncture between two swinging doors and no hinges on which they could have swung. There were no gates, just a metal grate blocking the only way they knew to get out of here. They were, as they had half-seriously speculated, trapped.

"Trowa..." Quatre's call was tight with a sudden anxiousness that didn't seem to pertain to the gates alone, and Trowa whirled to see what else might have given him cause to fear. As he stepped from the shadowed hedge arch, he could easily make out the unexpected sight that had brought that tone to Quatre's voice: a dark figure, bounding along like a dog on all fours but bigger than any dog Trowa had ever seen, approaching rapidly down the gravel road from the palace.

They probably should have run, but Trowa, at least, found himself strangely riveted at the sight of the approaching creature. He couldn't take his eyes from it as they tried to puzzle out what it was and how it could possibly be shaped the way it seemed to be. For one thing, it was huge; for another, it seemed a cruel and unlikely combination of various forms of life that shouldn't have been able to hold together and yet were moving at an impossibly quick run. And as it neared, it abandoned its four-legged stride and traversed the last few paces upright like a man.

One of the books in the old estate library had been a encyclopaedia of animals, with careful engravings of various creatures from distant parts, many of which Trowa remembered a younger Quatre not believing really existed. And if his memory served him correctly, the head of this creature - this monster, this Beast - which looked like it should overbalance the rest of the body but never quite seemed to, was that of a bison, all fluffy hair and long face and tiny eyes, with two black horns and a great nose.

The body was relatively man-like, though wide and bulky (probably to maintain the weight of the head), sufficiently supple to allow for running on all fours, and covered in the same curling, dark brown hair that lengthened as it reached the juncture of the legs into a sort of natural loincloth. These legs ended with the powerful, scaly talons of a great bird - an eagle, perhaps - but they were black, and the three-toed feet with their sharp-nailed points were huge and deadly-looking.

Like an ape's, the Beast's arms hung almost to the ground when it moved uprightly, but the hands at the ends of them looked more like great cat's paws. Oddly, one of them bore a scratch or wound up near the shoulder; the red blood oozing slowly from it was a bright contrast to the dark brown hair. And behind, waving sinuously back and forth as if to maintain balance (and probably doing so, counteracting the weight of the head), a huge, shining, segmented tail like that of a scorpion curled up and over the Beast's back, looking as if it might at any moment strike at its prey.

Its prey was Trowa. The Beast was on him before his startled, fascinated eyes could tear away and his interested mind could disengage from the pursuit of examining the creature and turn to deciding what to do about it. It bore him to the ground with superhuman strength, one bird-like talon locking each of his legs in place while a viciously clawed hand pressed into his neck. The horses, oddly unafraid of the Beast specifically but a bit startled by the sudden vigorous movement in their immediate vicinity, trotted away with whickers of protest.

Trowa, all the breath knocked out of him from being slammed so precipitously to the ground, the blood already beginning to slow in his legs where they were gripped so tightly, feeling the cool smooth slide of the scorpion's tail across his face and the prick of claws at his neck, could do nothing, could practically _think_ nothing, as he looked up into a small, dark eye and felt hot breath from the Beast's nostrils on his shoulder.

"Trowa!" Quatre shouted desperately, and threw himself quite recklessly at the Beast pinning his servant to the gravel. The Beast raised a muscular arm and pushed him away - did not slap him away or strike out at him, but evidently pushed with enough force to send Quatre stumbling backward and falling. Then the Beast turned its attention back to Trowa and, to the latter's great astonishment, spoke in a human voice.

"I welcomed you." The tone was all the more frightening for its relative calm. "I fed you. I gave you a place to sleep, a place for your horses for the night. I didn't ask anything of you. Why would you steal one of my roses?"

Trowa could find nothing to say. Astonished to hear such a strange creature speaking intelligibly, surprised at the odd choice of offense the Beast had mentioned, and still a bit stunned from being thrown to the ground, he simply had no words.

Quatre, on the other hand, had regained his feet, and was pounding at the Beast's shoulder and torso with his fists. "Let him up! Let him go!" he was shouting, but when he heard the Beast's complaint he changed his tactics. "He gave the rose to me! The rose was for me! Don't take it out on him!"

Abruptly Trowa found himself free, chest heaving and legs tingling, as the Beast was off him in a single movement smoother than any Trowa would have thought it capable of with those mismatched parts. He struggled to sit up at least some of the way, and saw that the Beast was now advancing on Quatre, tail again raised.

"Do you mean that?" the Beast demanded. "The price of one stolen rose is one human life. Will you pay that for him?"

"Quatre!" Trowa gasped, something in the area of his left breast seeming to tear as he tried to struggle up. But his body was refusing to cooperate at the moment; his chest was weak and his legs were unresponsive.

"Well, I'd really rather not die," Quatre admitted breathlessly, raising his hands in supplication as he backed slowly away. The fear was evident in his eyes, but he managed to speak relatively smoothly as he added, "But I can't let you kill him either."

The Beast paused in its forward progress, its tail snaking forward to run almost caressingly down Quatre's cheek. "A life can be paid in different ways," it said, in a softer tone than before, though there was still a growling edge to it like a serrated blade. "I don't have to kill you if you promise to spend the rest of your life here."

Trowa knew what was coming, and, though he couldn't see any way out of it any more than he was sure Quatre would, he couldn't stand it. "Quatre..." he gasped again. "No..." He would rather have his heart struck through by the creature's deadly sharp tail than have it broken by this choice on Quatre's part.

But Quatre had already made it, apparently even without effort. "All right," he said.

"You'll stay here forever?" the Beast asked softly.

"If you'll let Trowa go."

"Do you swear it?"

"Do you swear to let Trowa go?"

"I'm not going anywhere." For all they seemed to hear him, Trowa might as well have been in Silbreaker, or on the moon.

"Your friend is free to come and go as he pleases," said the Beast, "if you will stay here with me forever. I swear to God."

"Then I swear to stay here for the rest of my life," replied Quatre calmly.

Trowa let out a pained sigh, let himself fall back limply onto the gravel and stare into the sky. He heard the crunch of the Beast's footsteps retreating, then its gruff voice as it said, "If you're ever tired of this place and want to die, tell me. I'll kill you quickly."

"I..." Quatre sounded horrified.

"It's not as unlikely as you think," replied the Beast, now from several feet away. And in its voice Trowa thought he heard an echo of the sadness he'd sensed so strongly last night and to a lesser extent this morning.

Then Quatre was kneeling at his side, fluttering hands moving desperately across his chest to his neck and head, checking for injuries. "Trowa!" he whispered. "Are you all right?"

Trowa closed his eyes against the sight of Quatre's worried face. "I think so," he replied in equally quiet tones. "You?"

"Yes," Quatre swallowed. "Can you sit up?" And he helped Trowa to do so.

Then the demand broke from Trowa like a tidal wave in from the sea. "What in Hell's name did you promise that for?" It came out in a quiet hiss, but it had the emphasis of an angry roar. "You can't stay here! You can't stay here with that thing, that just threatened to kill us both, for the rest of your life! You have to get back to your father, your sisters, your home... _our_ home!" He was running down; he wasn't made for emotional outburst. "Quatre, what have you done?"

"I'm sorry," Quatre said miserably. "I couldn't let him kill you."

"And I appreciate that," replied Trowa, rubbing at his legs where they were probably already bruising from the strength of the Beast's talons. "But you can't stay here."

"I have to." Quatre's tone was quiet, but he tried to smile a little as he went on. "I told you I didn't think this would be too bad a place to be trapped forever."

"But not with _that thing_." Trowa gestured to where the Beast, several paces off, was standing with its back to them. It stood leaning slightly forward, as if its massive head dragged it down, tail still swaying slightly as if for balance.

"I think that's where all the loneliness comes from," Quatre whispered. "Did you hear the way his voice sounded when he said, 'stay here with me forever?'"

Trowa _had_ heard how its voice had sounded. He'd also heard that same voice promise to kill Quatre quickly if this miserable, lonely place got too unbearable. "But that shouldn't mean you have to give up everything."

"It's done, Trowa." Quatre's statement was firm. "You heard me promise. It's all set."

Trowa bowed his head against the tears that threatened behind his eyes, and had nothing to say in response.

"I need you to ride back to my father and tell him," Quatre went on.

Trowa's head snapped up. "I'm not leaving you alone here with that thing."

"Trowa... that's very kind of you, but you don't have to share this punishment with me."

"Why not? _I_ cut the rose." When Quatre was obviously about to protest, Trowa went on quickly. "It's not about sharing a punishment. It's about not leaving you alone with a monster. The rest of your life, it says... how long will that be, living with those claws and that tail? If it gets so angry about someone cutting one rose, who knows how else you might provoke it into killing you?"

"If that's the case," Quatre said, a little unsteadily, "you won't be able to save me... it'll be better if you're _not_ here."

"I'm not leaving you," said Trowa flatly.

Quatre untensed just a little. "You've been saying that forever," he murmured with a sad smile. "You wouldn't leave us four years ago, or three years ago, or two..." He didn't have to mention any more specifically the events of those times; they were still etched painfully in both their hearts.

"_You_," Trowa said intensely. "I wouldn't leave _you_. Quatre." It was about the closest he'd ever come to complete honesty on this point. "And I won't leave you now."

Appearing touched and sad, Quatre squeezed his shoulder. "Thank you, Trowa. I don't know why you have to be so stubborn, but don't think I don't appreciate your loyalty."

"Loyalty..." Trowa echoed in a pointless murmur.

"But I still need you to ride to my father!" Quatre began again. "Somebody has to tell him the news from Silbreaker, and somebody has to tell him that I'm..." For the first time, just the hint of a crack entered his voice, a hint of what the promise he'd made really meant to him. "That I'm not coming home."

"I told you I'm not leaving you."

"But the horses are hired..."

Trowa shook his head. It wasn't that Quatre didn't have a point; it was just that Trowa could not envision any circumstance under which he would be willing to leave the man he had dedicated his life to alone with a touchy, murderous monster, even just for a few days.

"Then I don't... I don't know..." Quatre sounded desperate and perhaps on the point of tears - which was about how Trowa felt as well.

"Excuse me for listening in," came a growling voice from nearby. How the Beast had approached so close without their noting the shifting of gravel, the startled Trowa could not guess. He put a reflexive, protective hand out as if to shield Quatre, then forced himself to draw it back as worse than useless. The Beast went on. "If these horses need to go back to your home, I can send them."

Quatre looked up at the creature in wonder, then slowly got to his feet. "Can you?" He spoke hesitantly, obviously not wanting to ask anything of the Beast but needing to know. "They're hired horses, and my father definitely can't afford to pay the purchase price if they don't come back."

"Your father is poor?" the Beast guessed gruffly.

Quatre, who was helping Trowa to stand, nodded.

Abruptly the Beast turned. "Come with me." And it began moving off up the road toward the palace at a pace Trowa wouldn't have expected from its unnatural upright walk.

With a glance at Trowa and a slight shrug, Quatre moved to follow, and Trowa had no choice, therefore, but to do the same.

The Beast waited for them at the doors of the palace, and went immediately inside and up the grand staircase once they'd drawn even. It led them up more stairs and down corridors they hadn't yet seen, staying always just close enough that they could catch sight of the curve of its tail disappearing around a corner or hear the scratch of its talons on an uncarpeted floor ahead. Finally it stopped in a long, windowless room full of shelves and display tables.

"I don't need any of this," it declared, gesturing around. "Choose anything you think would help your family." It turned a padded, clawed finger toward where, unexpectedly, their saddle-bags lay on the floor, though Trowa could have sworn that they'd been draped over the horses outside just minutes before and nobody had brought them in this time. "Fill your bags. Then call for me." And without another word, it pushed past them out of the room. Trowa, shuddering in spite of his best attempts not to, felt fur or hair, unexpectedly soft, brush against his face as the Beast moved close beside him.

Quatre was staring around in bafflement; once he'd finished looking after the disappearing Beast, Trowa joined him in this pursuit. For the room was filled from floor to ceiling with ornaments and riches the like of which he'd never seen before: small sculptures in precious materials, figures of delicate porcelain and silver, gold-inlaid boxes overflowing with glittering jewelry, knick-knacks of every shape and description, little of it with any practical use but all of it made from the finest, most valuable materials.

"A couple of bags full of this could set them up for life," Quatre whispered. "All twelve of them."

Trowa nodded, but could not at first force himself to move. There was a lot to think about all of a sudden, and, possibly, to discuss; there was a lot to feel. And yet they didn't dare disobey the Beast's orders. They could dwell on the situation later - at least he hoped they could - but for now it was probably best to do what they'd come here for. So, his limbs feeling stiff and unwilling, he retrieved the first saddle-bag from the floor and set it on a table near the center of the room next to a snuff box that looked as if it was made out of shell.

"Probably the jewelry would be the most efficient," he said pensively, opening both sides of the saddle-bag.

"Let's hope it doesn't get damaged, though," Quatre said after a deep breath, "all thrown into these bags together..." He took up the other saddle-bag, following Trowa's example and setting it on the table near the center, then turned his attention to the shelves on the walls.

Slowly they began picking through the multitude of shining objects, looking for the smallest and most valuable, placing them as carefully as they could inside the bags. From these they'd emptied their travel goods as less space-efficient and a good deal less valuable; the price even a few of the items in this room would bring would suffice to replace every single thing they'd brought with them on this journey.

After a while, Trowa noticed that Quatre was crying. He paused in the act of lifting a tiara off its stand and turned fully toward him with a questioning expression.

Quatre shook his head. "I'm just picturing my sisters unloading all of this. You know they'll try it all on before they let my father sell it."

At these words, tears sprang up in Trowa's eyes as well. He loved Quatre's sisters, if not nearly as much as he loved Quatre at least as much as should be expected after having lived with them for most of his life. In response he only nodded, however, and turned to put the tiara in the bag.

They found after a good hour of this that, though more jewels and other precious things had passed through their hands than ever before in their lifetimes, there was still a great deal of space left in the bags. It didn't seem possible, but Trowa was beginning to accept that a lot that happened here shouldn't have been possible. So they looked at each other, shrugged, and started to comb the room again.

After perhaps another hour, when the bags were still only half-full of the most valuable-looking items they could find, they began seizing objects off the shelves at random and pressing them into the strangely magnified space with less care. Jewelry boxes, figurines, combs and hand mirrors, everything they could lay hands on went in. And finally the bags were full, ready to be closed and carried away. Quatre and Trowa might originally have intended to stuff them to bursting point and force the flaps down, but, knowing how much they'd actually put into them, were content to fill them to just near the tops and close them gently.

The problem arose when they tried to lift them - for the bags, as Trowa realized he should have predicted, given what was in them, barely shifted even when they applied all their strength, and the heavy stitching holding the leather pieces together seemed more likely to split than the bags ever to move. Angrily he pushed at one of them, and heard the slight clink of something shifting inside.

"That Beast is mocking us," he said, sounding somewhat beastly himself with his low growl.

"Let's wait and see," said Quatre soothingly. Then, turning toward the door, he called out somewhat tentatively, "Beast?"

Immediately the Beast entered the room, and Trowa wondered if it had been just outside the door the whole time, listening. But all it said was, "You're finished?" When Quatre nodded, it moved to the table and picked up both saddle-bags, slinging one over each shoulder as easily as if they had been empty. It had no comment about the weight, or about Trowa's mockery remark, only headed for the door again. Equally wordlessly, the two men followed.

"Excuse me, sir," Quatre said as they walked, before the Beast had had time to get too far ahead of them again.

"There's no need for that," the Beast growled. "I'm no 'sir.'" Silently, Trowa agreed.

"I was wondering if I could write a message to my family," Quatre went on humbly. "These things-" he gestured at the saddle-bags over the Beast's shoulder- "are wonderful, and I'm very grateful, and they will be too... but I would like to send them a... goodbye."

The Beast nodded and, apparently, abruptly changed its course. This time it led them to a sort of office where a number of bookshelves surrounded a large, carved ebony desk. The Beast grunted, gesturing slightly, and took up a position outside the door.

"Thank you," said Quatre, and, quite obviously trying not to stare around the room at details he would have plenty of time to familiarize himself with in years to come, moved toward the desk.

Everything necessary for writing was quickly found, but the actual process of writing was not so quick. Trowa paced behind Quatre as the latter sat, unmoving and pensive, in the carved desk chair. "I don't know what to say..." he admitted at last.

Trowa had no suggestions. What _could_ you say in a situation like this?

Finally, with a resigned breath, Quatre dipped pen in ink and placed it on the paper. He wrote as if the effort it took to do so was huge, a few brief lines only, and then capped the ink bottle and laid the pen aside. Trowa, looking down over his shoulder, read, _My dear family- Trowa and I cannot come home, but we send you all our love, and these gifts. I hope they help you start a better life. Love forever, Quatre._

When the ink was dry, Quatre stood with another deep sigh and moved out of the room. Trowa followed to find him looking up at the Beast and its burdens, which it hadn't even shifted on its shoulders, let alone put down. Quatre was about to reach up to place the folded note in one of the saddle-bags, when the Beast suddenly extended one of its long arms and snatched the paper from Quatre's hand.

Quatre jumped back, startled, but the Beast just shook the message open and perused it - probably to be sure it wasn't a plea for help of the armed variety. Then, without comment, it re-folded the note clumsily with paw-like hands that weren't meant for such tasks, and stuffed it in one of the bags as Quatre had intended.

The horses had wandered onto a lawn and were placidly chewing on grass when the humans and the Beast returned outside. All of a sudden, seeing them, Quatre broke into a run to catch up with the Beast, which was, as usual, some distance ahead of them. "Wait!" he protested, impetuously reaching up to touch one of the great arms. "You can't put those on the horses - the weight will kill them!"

The Beast slowed, then stopped, turning toward Quatre and looking down at him with no expression that Trowa could read. Then it said, "It will be all right."

"But-"

"I promise." And it turned and continued onward toward the horses.

As before, the latter seemed oddly unafraid of something so strange and intimidating approaching them. In fact, when the Beast ran a hairy hand with unexpected gentleness down the mane of one, the horse turned its head and nuzzled at the terrifying creature with a soft, approving sound. Perhaps it was some sort of animal connection; Trowa couldn't say.

The Beast gestured, and both horses and men followed it to the hedge-wall, stopping at the dark arch still barred by the impassible gate that was not a gate. Unexpectedly, the Beast then reached up to the hedge and, with a swift, snapping movement, plucked a rose from among the leaves above its head. Specifically concurrent with this motion, a gash like the one on its arm appeared red and raw on its lower back just above where fur gave way to the hard, shining skin or shell of the tail; seeing this, Trowa caught his breath, and thought he heard Quatre do the same. No wonder, after all, the Beast was so sensitive about its roses! ...though that cut, painful as it appeared, did not seem quite the equal of a human life.

Drawing clawed fingers down the rose's stem over and over until it was free of thorns, the Beast said nothing, nor gave any indication that it had been wounded. Then, again clumsily as its hands were ill-suited to the purpose, it wove the rose into the bridle of the first horse. This had an immediate and very odd effect: the animal's eyes went wide, and it stiffened, tensing as if to spring forward in a desperate race toward some unknown goal. Nervously it paced until its head was pressed against the metal of the gate and it could go no further; it shook and whickered impatiently, pawing the ground.

A second rose retrieved and a second new wound occasioned, a second stem de-thorned and a second horse inexplicably enervated by the addition to its tack, the Beast now swung the heavy saddle-bags off his shoulders one by one and onto the backs of the straining mounts. Trowa was not terribly surprised when the horses made no objection whatsoever to this new burden, and indeed did not even seem to notice it. Seeing that the Beast had some difficulty with the straps, Trowa felt a servant's urge to step forward and help, but couldn't quite bring himself to do so for fear of offending the Beast again; instead, he just continued to watch in silence as the great clawed hands slowly and awkwardly got the saddle-bags properly fastened.

Once that was done, the Beast made another gesture, and the gate split down the middle and swung ponderously open. Like a shot from a crossbow the horses were off, down the forest-encroached road in a straight line, maintaining an unswerving distance from each other across the ground still somewhat soft from yesterday's rainfall, powerful and swift and determined.

"What was that?" Quatre wondered softly.

"With those roses," the Beast explained, turning away, "they can run all the way to your home without tiring."

"And the saddle-bags?" put in Trowa darkly. He could just imagine them growing suddenly, lethally heavy again the moment the horses reached their destination.

"They'll regain their proper weight once they're unloaded." The Beast's level tone was already fading as it moved with its improbably swift stride up the gravel road toward the palace.

"Wait!" Quatre called, following him at a trot. Trowa, as he always would, followed Quatre. "What do you want us to do?"

"Do as you please," the Beast answered briefly, not slowing his pace, so that Quatre was forced to continue running to keep up. "Explore if you want."

"But... where are you going? What are you going to do?"

"It's better if I'm not with you for now." The Beast's tone, though still flat, was also somewhat bitter as it said this. They'd already reached the tiled courtyard at the palace entrance, so great had been their speed in moving up the gravel road; the Beast took two more steps around the fountain, toward the great doors, then paused and looked back. "I'll join you for supper. Before then - and any time - if you ever want to talk to me, just call."

Then, in a movement of snakelike quickness, it dropped to all fours and bounded through the doors. They could see it leaping up the stairs with impossible speed, after which it disappeared across the landing, and Quatre and Trowa were left staring after it, somewhat dumbfounded.

...

...

...

The biggest problem with living in such an old building was that, back when it had been built, people hadn't yet started putting pumps in kitchens where they might logically be wanted. So if Duo felt like a drink late in the evening, but the buckets were empty and nobody was going to bother to fill them until morning, he _had_ to put on some shoes (that or endure his mother's complaints about his running around barefoot - and his mother _always_ knew) and walk all the way out and across the road. Sometimes it was cold, or he'd step on something sharp, or he'd be startled by a snake he would then spend a fruitless twenty minutes trying to catch. And sometimes a mysterious stranger would melt out of the deeper shadows and greet him with a quiet, "Good evening."

All right, well, that last one didn't usually happen.

"Evening," Duo replied, looking up. The moon was fairly bright, but in its current position it cast the shade of the trees all over this side of the road; Duo could make out very little of the stranger.

"It's a nice night."

"Yeah."

"Two days after a heavy rain is perfect." The voice was a man's, perhaps around Duo's age, somewhat dark, somewhat monotone, but gentle. It also sounded a little foreign - not as if the man were speaking a second language, but enough to make it obvious that he wasn't from around here.

"People do say that," Duo agreed. "The mud's dried, but the forest still feels fresh, or something like that. But I love rain."

"Do you?"

"Yeah."

"You live in that church?"

"That's right." Duo didn't feel the need to volunteer any more information until he found out what the stranger wanted.

"I live southeast of here. Past the square."

"I see." Duo felt there was something fundamental missing in this conversation. An introduction of some kind, perhaps. Or a point. Which was actually somewhat amusing. He hauled his newly filled bucket up and started walking. As he'd hoped, the stranger moved with him, and soon they'd emerged from the tree-shadows into the brighter space of the road. Here, right in the middle of the hard dirt way that sloped up the mountain in one direction and around a bend in the other, Duo stopped, set down his bucket again, and turned.

It was still a little difficult to tell, but Duo thought the stranger _was_ about his age. He had short, messy hair that could have been any dark color, and features that looked unexpectedly precise and well-formed even in the moonlight. There was nothing particularly unusual about him, except that he'd just appeared out of nowhere and struck up a discussion seemingly from the middle with someone that had never seen him before.

"So," Duo asked at length, hoping for answers or at least further entertainment, "what are you doing up here?"

The stranger shrugged. "I only heard recently there's another church up here. I wanted to see it."

"You're lying," Duo said bluntly. He didn't bother to hide his somewhat amused interest, though.

The stranger stiffened, undoubtedly a little startled.

"I'm a church man." Duo pointed at the building thus referenced. "I can tell."

"I... well, yes," the other admitted. "That was mostly a lie."

"All right, so let's try again! What are you doing up here?"

"I wanted to meet you."

That sounded a lot more honest, but also a lot less plausible than the lie had. "Really?" Duo wondered; it was his turn to be a little startled. "Why?"

"I don't know," admitted the stranger. "I saw you at the festival two weeks ago, and..." He shrugged again. "I thought we could be friends."

"You know, I think I know who you are, now that I think about it." Duo put thoughtful fingers to his chin. "You're the carpenter's man, aren't you? From down at the other end? Aren't you supposed to be a shut-in who doesn't _have_ friends?"

"Yes, I am. I mean," the stranger amended quickly, "I _am_ the carpenter's assistant."

"So you're _not_ a shut-in who doesn't have friends?"

"I won't lie, since you'd catch me."

Duo laughed, and bent to retrieve his bucket again. "All right, carpenter's assistant who may or may not be a shut-in with no friends. You came up here to meet me because you thought I'd be able to change some of that? That's really strange." He was making his way toward the church again, around the side to where the little three-room priest's quarters opened out the back of the building.

"I know," murmured the other man, following.

"But Hell," said Duo - "and don't tell my mother I said that - I always like making new friends. So why don't you come in?"

"Thank you."

Inside, in the light of the lamp he'd left burning in the room when he'd come looking for a drink, Duo could see the stranger's face better, and was actually a little surprised at how handsome it was. In his experience, better-looking people usually had _more_ friends, not _fewer_; he wondered if he should be flattered that this one had sought him out. "My name's Duo," he said. "What's yours?"

"Heero."

"And where do you come from?" Duo gestured for Heero to have a seat on the stool by the hearth, and himself settled back onto another in a corner, stretching out his legs.

"Silverbreaker Cove. There wasn't much work there for carpenters... or there were too many carpenters for some to find much work. So I came here."

Duo nodded; that matched what he'd heard. "I've never seen the sea," he commented. "I've always wondered what it would be like."

A little wryly Heero answered, "Probably the reverse of what it was like when I saw a mountain for the first time."

"So tell me about it."

"It's..." Heero sought words for a moment, and continued slowly, "almost any color you can imagine. It depends on the time of day and year and the weather. Sometimes it's a dozen colors at once. You stare at it for minutes at a time trying to figure out where one stops and another starts. And when the sun shines on it, it's like a line of jewels on the horizon."

"Well, that sounds great," Duo said, impressed.

"It also smells like fish," said Heero in blunt contradiction. "All the time. Everything there smells like fish. Every street, every person, every room of your house."

Duo started to laugh, but immediately cut himself short and looked around. His mother would be asleep - or trying to sleep - only a room away, and Duo didn't want to disturb her. In a softer tone he said, "But _you_ don't smell like fish." Actually, he'd already specifically noted that Heero smelled like fresh lumber; it was rather pleasant.

"I hope not," said Heero gravely. "There's a pool in the forest not far from where I'm living now. I bathe there as often as I can. It's satisfying not having to smell like fish anymore."

Again Duo laughed, struggling to keep it quiet this time. "I like fish, though. We don't get sea fish much up here, so they're a treat to me."

"That is the one thing I miss," Heero admitted. "Nobody cooks fish properly around here."

The way he sat there on that stool was really more interesting than it should have been. He looked so restrained, so self-contained, as if he existed in a little atmosphere of his own and any contact anyone else had with him was due to his reaching out rather than letting anyone in. Which made it all the more odd that he _had_ reached out, this evening, to a complete stranger. Duo had a sudden desire to get in there, and immediately, almost without thinking, asked the most personal question he could come up with to reply to the previous statement. "That can't be _all_ you miss... didn't you have family?"

Heero shrugged. "Not exactly. My mother died when I was born. My father was a drunk. He sold me into apprenticeship to a carpenter when I was six or seven. I didn't see much of him after that, so I've never really missed him. And my old master died recently, so I wouldn't have seen him again in any case."

"That's so sad!" Duo realized that he'd said this overloudly; curse these thin walls.

Heero just shrugged again.

"I'd be massively upset if my mother died. She's sleeping in the next room here," Duo added, in explanation of his softer tone. "She adopted me as a kid, and she's been nothing but wonderful, even if she does talk about _God_ all the time."

"What's wrong with God?" Heero wondered, sounding startled and interested; he'd probably noticed the hood Duo's mother _would_ insist he wear, and gotten the wrong idea as most people did.

"Well, if you've got time to hear about it..."

Duo wasn't sure how long they spent in his tiny kitchen talking about every random subject that came up, he trying to pry Heero open like one of those ocean things with the shells and Heero just sitting there becoming more and more interesting; he only knew that Heero was an unexpectedly good conversational companion for someone that, according to common report, wasn't big on talking, never went out drinking despite how often he was invited, and had such an aura of inscrutability about him. And only when the discussion made its way back around, somehow, to Heero's odd behavior in showing up here and requesting Duo's friendship before he'd even introduced himself did Heero deem it time to depart.

"I'll come up here again, if you don't mind," he said, and sounded almost shy about it, as he took his leave.

And though Duo still thought this all rather unusual, he wasn't averse to the idea, so he just shrugged and replied, "Sure. Drop by any time." Then he stood out on the step watching Heero disappear into the darkness down the road before he retreated inside and finally had his forgotten drink of water.

He frowned a little as he went thence to bed, grappling with a strange feeling that something had changed - despite the fact that everything around him was so unaltered that Heero's visit might actually have been a dream for all he knew, might never have happened. Or at the very least - he thought it not too unlikely - might have been a momentary aberration of behavior on Heero's part, and Duo might never see him again. The mystery that was Heero and his appearance here would then never be solved, of course, but maybe it was better that way.


	3. Chapter 3

At last Trowa said, "Well..."

"I..." Quatre began, but really had nothing more to offer.

Trowa looked at him with that slight angling of brows and compression of lips that indicated concern. "We should find something to eat. You look like you could use it." And given how pale Trowa appeared at the moment, Quatre had no doubt that his own face was much the same.

He nodded. "And then... explore, he said? That sounds like... fun..." He wasn't entirely sure about that. However, he didn't see that there were many other options to be pursued.

Trowa's answering nod seemed forced.

They saw no sign of the Beast inside, but Quatre hadn't really expected they would. The lights, preceding them as usual, led them up into another section of the palace they hadn't yet visited; Quatre thought that, although they were simply candles springing to light and going out again, there was something pleased, an air of almost dog-like eagerness about them as they led Quatre and Trowa wherever they were leading them. Quatre supposed that, if they had any share in the entrail-twisting loneliness of this place, they might be as happy as anything else here that he had promised to stay forever.

Forever...

Abruptly, in a mental flash of familiar faces and the knowledge of the love and responsibility he'd always felt toward them, that word, that concept - _forever_ - crashed down on him in its massive entirety and shook his world to its core. He stumbled briefly on the stairs they were climbing and went still, clutching desperately at the balustrade.

It had been so easy to say, out there with that insectoid tail pressed against his face. In the moment, it had been incredibly easy to say anything, promise _anything_ that would put off death - his friend's or his own. In the long run, he feared, _life_ might be the much more difficult option - life in such a lonely place with such a frightening host, never seeing his father or sisters again...

"Trowa," he whispered. "What have I done?"

Calmly Trowa, who had appeared at Quatre's side the moment he faltered, ready to support him, answered the question he himself had posed to Quatre not long before. "Saved one or both of our lives."

The carved wood beneath Quatre's clutching fingers and the rich, warm colors around him came gradually back into focus at the sound of Trowa's level voice; the deep, stabbing sensation in his heart, which he'd previously thought might kill him, slowly diminished; and the brief pressure of a hand on his shoulder reassured him that Trowa was there. Even in this mad situation and this chilling place, Trowa was there for him. With a deep breath he forced himself to keep moving, following Trowa and the eager lights.

Lunch was set out in a beautiful open-air room like a balcony covered with potted plants. Glass doors on one side led into a greenhouse where Quatre could see a world of exotic foliage that seemed, for once, not to consist of roses, and he had to admit that, despite his agitation, he was curious. Trowa, however, pulled out one of the wrought-iron chairs at the similarly-constructed table with silent insistence, and Quatre moved in that direction rather than toward the enticing glass.

At the slightly suspicious determination in the set of Trowa's jaw as he waited for Quatre to begin eating, Quatre felt something unknot inside of him. He must still be looking particularly pale, and Trowa wasn't going to let him leave this room until he'd done something about it... and that was comforting, somehow.

"You're being reassuringly mundane about all of this," Quatre said with a faint smile.

"What's done is done. I can just make the best of things."

Quatre smile widened sadly. "I'm sure you can. But can I?"

"I've seen you put up with worse than this." Trowa made an ironic gesture at the luxurious beauties around them.

"But everyone at home... I'm not so worried about how they'll get on after sending all those things, but... I just can't stand the thought of never seeing them again."

Trowa's lips tightened, and he obviously had nothing to say to refute this; Quatre would have been disappointed if he had.

They ate in silence, an excellent lunch of fresh fruit and flaky pastry with cold chicken in a creamy sauce, and looked out over the elaborate railings of the balcony onto the grounds. Quatre was trying not to think about his father or sisters, but, though he was fairly successful, the predicament in general could not but be heavy on his mind.

And he couldn't help reflecting, suddenly, what this would have been like if he'd been alone... if he'd come here by himself somehow and offended the Beast, or if Trowa had done as he'd asked and ridden away. He doubted he would have made it up the stairs to lunch, to begin with; he would probably be curled up helplessly beneath the fountain down in front of the entrance, terrified and weeping.

"Thank you," he said suddenly, looking up at his friend, "for staying here with me."

"Thank _you_," replied Trowa seriously, "for keeping that Beast from killing me."

Quatre smiled wryly. "You didn't think I'd do anything else, did you?"

Trowa, who was finished eating, stood and moved slowly to the railing. "You pulled it off me onto yourself. Don't think I'll forget that."

Heart beating overquickly again for some reason, Quatre tried for a joke: "It _was_ pretty brave, wasn't it?" Though the truth was that he'd hardly been thinking at the time: he'd just done whatever had occurred to him that might get a murderous monster off his best friend. As he too stood from the table, he found Trowa turning back toward him, looking at him carefully. Quatre forced a smile and said, "Is my color better? Shall we go exploring now?"

Trowa returned the smile, and his looked almost as unenthusiastic as Quatre's felt. But he nodded and turned toward the greenhouse doors.

It was wet and steaming inside, full of interesting blended scents and, to their surprise, birdsong. The latter, they discovered once they'd admired and puzzled over the many beautiful and unfamiliar plants, arose because the room opened onto an aviary, and the birds had freedom to fly throughout the greenhouse as through the distant forests they had undoubtedly originally come from.

They were birds such as Quatre had only seen pictured in books: flamboyantly colorful and very wild-looking... and yet they proved quite friendly. Many were willing to come down from vines or branches or their delicately-inlaid ivory perches to sit on arms and shoulders and eat from a hand the seeds that were in ready supply in bright boxes all around the room. They introduced themselves in almost human-like voices, and seemed disappointed when the men moved on.

The other rooms Quatre and Trowa looked through that day had a few things in common: the color scheme they had already seen of mahogany, burgundy, gold, and white; beautifully carved ebony furniture, often pillowed with velvet; similarly carved stonework wherever this base material of the building showed through; a heavy, lonely silence devoid of any feeling of life but their own; and a size and number purely impossible to fit inside the palace as they had seen it from the outside.

They looked out windows in all directions - north and south onto the narrowest expanses of the grounds and the forest beyond, west onto rocky mountainside that leapt abruptly up at the palace's back, and east over a view they were coming to know well - so they always had a general idea of where they were... and yet sometimes it didn't seem possible for them to _be_ where they were. The third time Quatre, after glancing out a window in one room, found himself looking at the same view without any apparent shift in angle four doors down, he was finally forced to accept that the palace was simply bigger on the inside.

There was a plethora of bedrooms with adjoining parlors; there were elegant breakfast rooms, and playrooms for children; there were marble washrooms fit for a king. "How many guests does this Beast expect?" Trowa wondered cynically as they climbed a flight of stairs.

On the next level there were offices and reading rooms. Above that, an enormous library smelled of all the books in the world (and roses) and seemed to take up the entirety of two floors. Here Trowa, at least, would have been content to remain, leaving further exploration for another time; but the presence of an open book on one of several cushions in a sunken area of the floor designed for comfortable reading, combined with certain movements Quatre thought he caught out of the corner of his eye, led Quatre to hasten them on before they could either inconvenience the Beast with their presence or be forced to deal with him when it was not strictly necessary.

Moving again upward, they found evidence that boredom at least must be impossible here. Quatre didn't take much interest in the chamber full of cloth and boxes of thread and needles, varied and dazzling though the many colors and textures were; but he gazed greedily and enthusiastically over a large room that contained every musical instrument he'd ever heard of and seemed to have been built to acoustic perfection.

Another room held a variety of paints and brushes as well as easels and blank canvasses of all sizes, and this chamber opened onto a long gallery of examples of this type of work. "I doubt most of them were painted in that room, though," Trowa remarked, gesturing behind them. Quatre had to agree; too many of the paintings on the velvet-hung walls were far too happy-looking.

The next room was also a gallery, this one of carvings mostly in white marble similar to the huge man and woman in the entry hall. And after this, a door opening onto a final, narrow staircase led them spiraling up to the towering highest point of the palace.

As they emerged through another door onto a windy, railed circular balcony that seemed to look down over the entire world, they were surprised to see that the sun was already behind the mountains and the landscape was orange and blue in patches. Tired though he was from all the walking and stair-climbing and admiring, Quatre wouldn't have guessed they'd been wandering for so many hours.

"It's a beautiful view," he said, moving to the railing to look out northward. "If I had better vision, I might be able to see to the edge of the forest from here." Though Beaulea would probably still be invisible, he refrained from adding aloud.

Trowa, who had not joined him at the railing but stayed by the door, still gripping its handle, said nothing; and Quatre, deeming it unwise to stand staring out toward a home he would never see again in the already forlorn light of sunset, turned away.

"I'm so tired of stairs," he complained as they headed back down. In an almost facetious gesture, Trowa patted him on the shoulder.

The tower stairs, they found, traversed the entire vertical length of the palace (unless there were more levels below ground) - and, indeed, were quicker to walk and had them all the way down to the bottom of the building much sooner than Quatre's weary knees expected. The first two floors were all they had left to look over, and they did so now, Quatre thought, more out of a desire for completion than any currently remaining curiosity. They were both tired, had seen enough fine rooms to last a lifetime, and Quatre's stomach was beginning to grumble.

Besides the huge entry hall and a number of visitors' parlors whose type they were already familiar with, they found an enormous ballroom - "For whom?" Trowa wondered - a succession of increasingly large dining rooms, and several halls that seemed to have been designed for parties or assemblies - "Why?" Trowa asked.

As the darkness grew, they found each room blacker than the previous, but the lights obligingly came on the moment they entered, like footmen snapping to attention. And when they felt they'd finally seen everything and Quatre addressed a tentative, "Supper?" to one of the ensconced candles, the usual leading pattern began.

They were taken to one of the smaller dining rooms, where the family would have had their more casual, private meals if this had been the home of a family of any kind (assuming it was not a family of fourteen). The table had eight places but was set for two, and the palace magic had even had the sense to put them only two seats apart rather than at opposite ends.

"You don't have to keep doing that," Quatre said, half-laughing, as Trowa pulled a chair out for him.

"I'm not going to waste the first chance I've had in years," Trowa replied.

Quatre snorted faintly, but did not argue. Instead, reminded, he remarked, "Do you know what we haven't seen anywhere yet? Kitchens. Or pantries. Or servants' quarters, or linen rooms, or laundries, or anything."

"They'll just be empty," Trowa said, sounding a little weary.

With a nod Quatre went on thoughtfully, "And what's more... you'd expect a place as big as this, so far from anywhere else, would have its own chapel... but we haven't seen anything like that either."

"You don't want to go looking for all of this tonight, do you?"

"No," said Quatre, reaching for one of the dishes in front of him. "Maybe tomorrow. I think I'll go to bed after supper. It isn't late, but I'm tired." He left unspoken the sentiment that it wasn't as if he wouldn't have plenty of time to find out everything there was to know about this place in the future, but he thought Trowa caught it even from his silence. Trowa only nodded, however, and joined Quatre in perusing what they had for supper.

They'd barely begun eating when a great carved door opposite the one by which they'd entered was flung open with a silence incongruous with the force and speed of its movement, and the Beast came bounding in on all fours. He didn't pause or greet them verbally yet, just loped right up to Trowa - who of the two of them was closer to the door - and began snuffling at him with his great nose. Trowa at first jerked away in startlement and fear, but then, when the Beast simply pressed closer to diminish the space again, went stiff and sat still.

Quatre watched in nervous silence, wondering whether the Beast was going to change his mind and send Trowa away after all - or worse. He'd sworn that Trowa was free to come and go as he pleased, but what did the sworn word of such a creature really mean? Or perhaps in exploring the palace today they'd caused some other inadvertent offense against its master and some other disproportionate price would now be demanded of them.

But the Beast merely finished his inspection of Trowa, and, without comment, bounded down the remaining length of the table to do the same to Quatre. At the nearness of the huge, warm, hairy bulk with its claws and deadly tail, at the feel of that hot breath moving over him, Quatre found himself sitting just as stiff and still as Trowa had - and in the corner of his eye he could see Trowa watching just as anxiously as Quatre had. The amusement that arose in him at this mirroring of behavior gave him confidence, and with a deep breath he said, "Good evening, Beast."

The Beast drew back and looked at him for a moment with one of his undersized eyes, in which Quatre thought there showed some interest. Then, in an unexpectedly hearty tone, he said, "Good evening!" And, circumnavigating Quatre's chair and end of the table with the same surprising snakelike litheness he'd displayed earlier, he moved to a spot approximately opposite the two diners. There he pulled a chair some distance out, jumped easily up onto it, and looked across the table at them both.

Nervous under that animal gaze and trying to think of something to say, Quatre snatched at the first thing he happened to notice in the Beast's vicinity - namely, the number of place settings. "Aren't you eating?" He asked it before he realized that he might very well not really want to know the answer. The Beast's head didn't look like part of a carnivorous animal, but other parts of his body did.

To Quatre's surprise, the Beast laughed, a rough, broken sound like the barking of a dog. "No, I'll spare you the sight of _that_," he said easily. "It's not appropriate for a room as nice as this."

Quatre stared at him, extremely curious about what he meant but unable to bring himself to ask.

"But _you_ can eat," the Beast went on. "Don't let me stop you. You've had that same bit of meat on your fork since I came in."

Quatre looked down, a little abashed. Despite his hunger and how marvelous the meal was, he'd entirely forgotten about the food on his own plate, and had indeed had a bite lifted just off of it for some time. As he put it in his mouth and chewed and swallowed, he stared at the wine in his glass and listened to the Beast's next comment.

"So I don't think we ever had a real introduction. You've been calling me 'Beast,' and you might as well keep on doing that since it _is_ accurate." Here some movement drew Quatre's eyes; the Beast was making an almost mocking bow from where he still stood on the chair. Then he fell into an easy crouch with his hairy arms laid across his upraised knees. "But what are your names?"

The voice was so casual and friendly, lacking the cool tonelessness of earlier, that if it hadn't been so much of a growl, Quatre might have been able to close his eyes and imagine he was talking to a normal man. As it was, he just answered the question. "I'm Quatre of the Winner Barony, and this is Trowa Barton."

"His servant," Trowa put in; for some reason he was always careful to clarify that part.

"A lord, huh?" The Beast sounded intrigued.

Quatre shrugged. "My father's the baron," he explained, picking at his food. "It's a wonder he didn't have the title stripped from him years ago; if there were still any administrative duties connected with it these days, he probably would have. As it is, he's just the poorest Lord Winner in family history. It's too bad he can't sell the title... When you don't always know where your next meal's coming from, being Lord Anything doesn't mean much."

"You _did_ say your father was poor," the Beast recollected. "How did that happen, if he's a baron?"

Quatre sighed and laid down his fork, reaching instead for his glass of wine. Of all the places he never would have thought to be tonight, here he was in a magical palace explaining the family misfortunes across a dinner table to a relatively terrifying monster that talked like a man. But after he'd drunk, he explained. "We were never a landed family. We had an estate, of course, in Silbreaker-"

"Silverbreaker Cove?" the Beast broke in interestedly.

Quatre nodded, and let his thoughts wander briefly to how long it had been since anyone had referred to the capital by its old, complete name, and how long, as a consequence, the Beast might have been shut off from the world. Then he went on.

"We had the estate, but the family fortune was always wrapped up in the shipping business. My father always took a direct interest in the business, instead of leaving it to his clerks. But about five years ago... now..." He paused, losing his train of thought again as he watched the Beast.

For the latter, absently raising one clawed hand to the opposite shoulder as if to scratch an itch as he listened, had brought it away bloody from the wound that still stood open there. When, glancing over at Quatre's pause in the narrative, he observed the man's slight gape, he looked down at his hand and made a soft, frustrated growling noise. "Sorry. There's another thing that's not appropriate for such a nice room!" And, leaning forward, he snagged a free serviette from the table and clumsily set about cleaning off his hand. He didn't touch the wound, though, and it was difficult thereafter for Quatre to remove his eyes from it. "Go on," said the Beast, almost harshly. "Five years ago...?"

"About five years ago..." Quatre cleared his throat. "My mother died on a sea voyage when the ship she was on went down in a storm. My father loved her very much - we all did - and after that he could never stand the sight of a ship again. He abandoned the business, and wouldn't even hear it talked of. He left it entirely to a friend of his, whom he'd always worked with... and who very sympathetically offered to help... but this man is..."

Quatre's hand clenched his own serviette into a cream-colored silken crumple. "I won't be unfair," he insisted, mostly to himself. "He's a good man. He cares about our family; he never tried to take advantage of my father's trust for his own good, which he could have done... But he's..."

"Not a businessman," Trowa put in. Quatre threw him a grateful glance. Trowa knew that Quatre struggled constantly not to be unjust toward the man that had always done everything he could for them, knew that Quatre would immediately regret the harsh term on the tip of his tongue, and had provided this gentler one instead.

"Within a year," Quatre went on, "he'd mangled my father's business so badly that we had to retrench and rent out our estate house. We had to leave a lot of our luxury and _most_-" he smiled forlornly at Trowa- "of our servants behind. My sisters - especially the younger ones - were confused about why we couldn't go on living the way we had, and they weren't very helpful when it came to cutting back on expenses.

"I was sixteen at the time, and I understood things a little better. I tried talking to my father about what his friend was doing to us, tried to make him see what I saw coming if he didn't do something about it, but he wouldn't listen. He always had trusted his friend, and he still trusted him; he was sure he would pull through this. And he thought I was too young to know what I was talking about. Of course I stupidly had to bring up my mother and what she would have wanted, and... it was probably the worst argument we ever had.

"Within another year, we were completely ruined. We had to sell the estate outright just to keep my father out of a debtor's prison. We left Silbreaker in shame and moved to a tiny house - well, tiny for all of us - in Beaulea, and we've been doing farm work and half-starving ever since. We would have been fine if there hadn't been so many of us... or if more of us had been capable of harder labor that pays better... but I have eleven sisters, and they're all younger than me."

"_Eleven?_" the Beast burst out. "What were your parents _thinking_?"

"That they'd always be rich," Quatre sighed.

"Well, at least you got to send them all those things today."

Brightening a little, Quatre nodded. "Thanks again for that. I think it will really help them."

The Beast shrugged; the motion was uncannily human, and uncanny in general with that red slash on one of his shoulders. "As if any of that stuff is any use to me." Then his tone reverted to the previous somewhat annoyed skepticism. "But didn't you have any friends or family who could have helped you?"

"My father was an only child, and his parents died years ago, so his inheritance was already part of what Roldeen - his friend - was losing for him. My mother's family cut her off entirely when she married because of some stupid old blood feud, and they wouldn't even answer my father's messages. And after that he refused to ask anyone for help - partly, I think, out of injured pride, and partly because he wanted to stand by his friend and not tell everyone whose doing it was that we were in such dire straits. But everyone knew... it was a bit of a scandal, actually, which I think was why none of our former friends from before things fell apart were willing to step forward and volunteer help - though they might have done something if they'd been specifically asked."

"And that friend of your father's?" growled the Beast. "What did _he_ do for you?"

Quatre laughed mirthlessly. "It wasn't only _our_ finances he ruined. Trowa and I just saw him in Silbreaker; he's living in a single room above a shop in Fishmarket Street. Not that there's anything wrong with living in Fishmarket Street," he added hastily, not looking at his friend that had been born there. "It's just that he's lost so much, and it's all his own fault."

Quatre wasn't sure how he thought he could tell, but the Beast's nod of understanding appeared pensive and pitying. Everyone was silent, and Quatre went back to picking at his food. He'd still eaten very little, but found he'd rather lost his appetite.

"Where is Beaulea?" the Beast asked at last, suddenly.

Tired of the story, Quatre didn't immediately answer, so Trowa supplied, "North of the forest." Quatre noticed he hadn't eaten much either.

"And what were you doing _in_ the forest?"

Trowa continued to provide information in Quatre's place. "Near the end, Lord Winner's friend sent out all three of the ships that remained to the business in a last-ditch attempt to turn a profit before everything was lost-"

"A last-ditch attempt to put all our eggs in one basket," Quatre muttered.

"It was probably a bad idea," Trowa agreed. "But there was no way he could have known they would all three be lost at sea. But just recently he sent us word that one of them had been sighted coming back at last. So we rode out to see if there was anything left on board to the Winner name."

"Some of my sisters still don't quite understand," Quatre put in wanly. "They were asking, before we left, if we could bring them back fine gowns and things like they used to have. They thought this one ship was going to make us as rich as we used to be."

"And let me guess," said the Beast: "It didn't."

Trowa shook his head.

"Just another mistake from my father's loyal friend." It was a losing battle for Quatre to keep the bitterness from his tone. "I know he thought he was helping, but he could have waited until he was sure..."

"It wasn't one of Lord Winner's ships at all," Trowa explained.

"The luck you folks have had..." The Beast shook his shaggy head, and he sounded somewhat sad; Quatre wondered whether in this statement he was including the fact that Quatre was now sworn to remain for the rest of his life in an enchanted palace with such an improbable creature.

Then the Beast turned toward Trowa, as if the latter's entrance into the conversation had reminded the Beast of his presence. "And you," he said, and added, "Trowa," almost experimentally.

"What about me?" Trowa wondered.

"You've been with them through all of this?"

Trowa nodded wordlessly.

"Good man. Well done. But how have they paid you if they were starving themselves?"

"They haven't. I haven't had a wage for two years."

Quatre threw him a startled look. He'd known that Trowa's wages had sunken pitifully, and he wouldn't have been surprised to hear that his friend had been working for only nominal recompense for quite some time... but _two years_ with _no_ pay? He felt, however, that now was not the time to bring it up.

The Beast was commending Trowa once again for his dedication, and when he fell silent Quatre ventured on another topic. "And what about you? You said we can call you 'Beast,' but what's your real name? Will you tell us about yourself and this palace?" It was as close as he dared come to asking, 'What the Hell is going on here?' which he thought might come across as a little rude. He didn't think questions like 'What _are_ you?' or 'How is it you can talk like a man?' would go over very well either.

But the Beast was not to be questioned even obliquely on this topic. In a movement that seemed somewhat annoyed, he stood up straight again on the chair, looming over the table with his great head for a moment before jumping down. "Actually," he said, "I think I've had enough of supper for tonight." He crossed the room on all fours, but went upright again at the door for just long enough to favor them once more with that ironic bow. "Good night to you both! I'll see you tomorrow." And then he was gone, bounding out the door that closed silently behind him, leaving Trowa and Quatre, for the second time that day, staring helplessly in his wake.

After a long silence Trowa pushed away his still-mostly-full plate with a regretful glance, as if to say he thought he'd had enough too.

"Having him in here made me too nervous to eat much," Quatre said. "Well, that and telling him all those things. But I thought he was easier to talk to than earlier."

Trowa nodded, standing up and moving to pull out Quatre's chair.

Outside the dining room, the lights immediately began to guide them again, which was a relief since Quatre doubted he could have found the bedrooms from last night on his own. They walked in silence through the shadowy corridors and up the stairs, and Quatre was contemplating the conversation they'd just had.

The Beast had seemed genuinely interested in his family's troubles; was that simply because he hadn't had anyone to be interested in before? He'd also appeared somewhat impressed to learn that his guest was the son of a baron, while he himself lived in a spectacular palace; who was he? Pensively, Quatre glanced behind, though he knew they were by now far away from the dining room and that the Beast wouldn't be visible anywhere around them in any case. What was his surprise, therefore, to see someone after all, dim in the light of the closest candles. With a hitch of breath Quatre stopped and turned entirely.

"What's wrong?" Trowa asked.

"Hey!" Quatre called, and took off back the way they'd come. "Who's there?" The figure he thought he'd seen, which had appeared to be a woman in a blue gown, had disappeared around a corner just as he'd caught sight of her; now his steps quickly re-covered the space of carpet between him and that corner as candles accommodatingly came back to life, but around the turn he found nothing.

"Who was it?" Trowa asked as Quatre flung open the nearest door onto a completely empty room. Evidently the magic hadn't anticipated this abrupt movement, since it usually opened doors ahead of them without their needing to touch the handles.

"I have no idea." Quatre stood still at last, chewing on his lip. "But we're not alone here."

"I don't know if that's comforting or not," Trowa murmured as they slowly resumed their progress toward their bedrooms.

Quatre had to agree with him, and remained pensively silent throughout the rest of the walk. They might have explored most of the palace during the course of that day, and they might be able to see everything there was to be seen of the grounds tomorrow, but he had a feeling there was a great deal more to this place than anyone could find in just a couple of days. And he couldn't really consider it a fortunate circumstance that he had all the time in the world to do so.

...

...

...

"It's, what, five miles from your house up here?"

On a grassy hillside that was the only spot in the vicinity devoid of trees (besides the road, of course), Duo was lying on his back looking up at the stars. They'd done this a lot lately, not necessarily because the stars were more interesting or attractive recently but because they'd discovered that it was a perfect atmosphere for private conversations, a place where they could talk and laugh as much as they wanted without disturbing anyone.

When Heero confirmed the distance cited by Duo, the latter idly started picking individual grass blades that lay beneath his hand and throwing them at Heero. Sometimes they landed on Heero, sometimes they fell between the two men; every once in a while the breeze picked up and threw them back at Duo.

"How long does that take?"

"An hour, if I walk fast," Heero replied, lying still under the grassy assault and making no protest.

"So that's at least two hours a night you spend walking," Duo mused. "And you're usually here with me for at least another two. How much sleep can you possibly be getting?"

"Not a lot," admitted Heero. He sounded at first as if he might go on to some kind of explanation, but eventually his silence deepened and it was obvious that he would say no more.

"And this doesn't bother you at all?"

Heero's shoulders shifted through the grass in a shrug. "Not really."

"I mean, _I_ can sleep in; all I ever have to do is transcribe old church records or do chores around the place or run easy errands. So it doesn't matter how long I'm out here, or if I feel like spending half the night taking a long walk. But you do some pretty heavy work sometimes, don't you?"

"Not much, anymore. You remember I did that carving on those chairs for Ireen the weaver? Alan realized he can get a better price on just about anything if I carve it first. He has me mostly doing that now."

Duo raised himself up on one fist and gave Heero a skeptical look. "So instead of hammer and nails, you're working with knives sharp enough to cut wood... but lack of sleep doesn't bother you."

Heero shook his head.

After throwing an entire handful of grass at him this time, Duo lay back down and pillowed his head on his arms. For several silent seconds he watched the stars, but he wasn't properly seeing them. Finally he said, "What I guess I'm really trying to figure out is what's so interesting up here that's worth you giving up half your sleep-time for."

Heero remained silent.

"Because as far as I can tell, you're not coming up here for any other reason than just to talk to me. Not that I'm complaining, but, seriously, why?"

Still Heero said nothing.

Duo removed his arms from the prickling grass beneath his head and folded his hands across his chest. "It's been almost three months now," he went on conversationally, for all Heero seemed determined to keep this one-sided. "You just showed up here one night and announced that you wanted to be friends, and that made no sense, but it worked fine... in fact, I'm not sure how you became my _best_ friend as quick as you did. And then you've been coming up here almost every night ever since then."

From beside him, silence.

"And you always get quiet about it, just like this. You never want to tell me what it is you really come up here for."

Finally Heero spoke: "There's nothing to tell."

"You know I can always tell when you're lying," said Duo dismissively.

"What do you want me to say? I come up here to see you."

"Yes," Duo allowed in some annoyance, "but that's not all there is to it. _Why_ do you come up here to see me?"

"Would you rather I stayed home?"

"Stop being evasive!"

Heero made a frustrated noise, and moved abruptly. Rolling over, he threw himself on top of Duo, straddling his legs and keeping him down in a sort of wrestling hold. And just as if they _had_ been wrestling, Duo's heart was suddenly pounding and his breaths were coming a little short, though he hadn't actually made any real exertion.

"When I first saw you at the festival," Heero said quietly, almost grimly, his face very close to Duo's, "you were dancing. I couldn't stop staring at you. I could barely even see who you were dancing _with_ because it hurt to move my eyes that far off you. Then for the next two weeks I couldn't get rid of the memory. I saw your face everywhere I looked. I saw you dancing. I dreamed about you at night, when I could sleep at all, and I didn't even know your name. I _had_ to come find you. It was like I didn't have a choice. You were going to drive me mad otherwise.

"But once I did find you, it only got worse. I _still_ see you when I close my eyes. I _still_ dream about you. And whenever I'm not here with you, I wish I were. You're all I can think about. When I'm with you is the only time I feel like I'm alive, instead of plodding through some routine that just goes on and on and never makes me happy. And the idea of _not_ coming up here to see you... of spending a quiet night at home without you, working on something or sleeping... it's impossible. It would kill me."

Duo stared up at the glint in Heero's dark eyes, smelling cedar, wondering why the throbbing of his heart had yet to diminish and wondering why the heat of Heero's body atop his seemed so much more noticeable than if they really had just been playfully wrestling in the grass. For a long moment he had nothing to say in response to the unexpected outburst; he could only lie there and feel. But finally he managed a chuckle, and remarked, "It sounds a little like you're in love with me." Then he sobered completely as the meaning of what he'd said hit him. "Actually it..." Now that he thought about it... His voice sank almost to a whisper. "It sounds a _lot_ like you're in love with me."

Heero's eyes had widened slowly at the sound of Duo's words, and now in a sudden movement he got to his feet and started walking away down the hill and into the trees. Duo, combating an unexpected turmoil of heart and regretting the careless statement that had driven Heero from him, taken his warm weight off of him, struggled to rise and follow. "Hey, I didn't..." he began as he caught up, but he wasn't sure what to say.

"Is that it?" Heero murmured harshly, not slackening his pace. More quietly still he wondered, "What is wrong with me?"

"Nothing!" Duo's heart beat even faster, his chest seemed tight and painful, and suddenly he was thinking about all the things that were implied by that phrase 'in love.' He'd always assumed that someday he would find himself there, but he'd never had a particularly clear picture of what it might involve: just a hazy, faceless figure at his side through a number of vague, comfortable circumstances.

But now it was as if a fog had shredded from before his mental vision, for all of those circumstances seemed suddenly real and detailed and very desirable, and the figure that shared them with him invariably had both a face and a name. It was bizarre and perhaps a little frightening, but it was perfectly unambiguous. He felt his throat constrict, and his next words came out sounding choked: "Nothing that isn't wrong with me too..."

Finally Heero slowed his manic stride, pausing in the deep tree-shadows and turning to look at Duo with a face almost invisible and a voice full of uncertainty. "What do you mean?"

"I mean I'm pretty sure I'm in love with you too." Duo's tone was not terribly strong as it shaped these strange words, but he pushed onward anyway. "I never thought about it before, but... but I think I am."

"Duo..." Heero gripped Duo's arms tightly with his strong carpenter's hands, and now in his voice, behind the continuing desperate uncertainty, was a hope he was trying fiercely to conceal or even eradicate. "How can we... there's no way... Duo, we're both men."

"Oh, you noticed that?" The joke fell utterly flat, but it had at least been worth a try. Slowly and more seriously, "I don't know about the 'how,'" Duo went on. "But what you just described, and what I'm feeling now... if that isn't love, then somebody's been telling me wrong for years and years."

"But then..." Heero's arms dropped, but something about his stance changed with these words, eased somehow. He still seemed very stiff and uncertain, but whereas previously his response to this had been flight, away from Duo and the discussion and the startling truth of their situation, the uncertainty seemed now rather to include Duo, as if they two were together in this and the enemy, if there was one, lay outside of them both. "What do we do?"

Duo reached out through the shadows and took Heero's shoulders. The warmth under his hands only made them hunger for more, so he stepped forward to embrace him fully, pressing up against Heero's rigid figure. "I'm not sure," he said.

Though Duo could not have called it 'relaxing,' Heero did slowly lean into him and raise his own arms again to return the embrace, almost tentatively, as if he dreaded moving with any more purpose.

It was a strange, sad, wonderful moment; Duo still wasn't sure how this had happened, didn't quite understand how two men could have come to this, but he was increasingly confident of what he felt for Heero. The realization of it had been abrupt and unexpected, but he saw now that the feeling itself had been slowly growing over the last few months since he'd met him.

Heero's skin against his jaw and neck was smooth and inviting, and Duo couldn't help reflecting once again on some of those images of love he'd hazily cherished for so long and now pictured so much more clearly. "I think..." he said at last, into the silent darkness, "I know one thing we _can_ do." Drawing back - a little reluctantly, it was true, for Heero so warm and solid against him was something he didn't wish to abandon - he raised his hands to Heero's face.

"What?" Heero's features were nearly invisible in the shadowy forest, but there was still a glint that marked his eyes as they looked intently at Duo.

"You can kiss me."

Duo felt the face beneath his fingers go hot. "Can I?" Heero asked, sounding almost childlike, and rather uncertain yet, in his surprised anticipation.

"I'm pretty sure you can." Duo still couldn't make a joke work in this serious atmosphere, but it came closer this time than the last one had.

And so Heero kissed him, a soft, almost frightened touch of mouth against mouth for which Duo's few, careless kisses with girls in the past had _not_ adequately prepared him. When it was finished he couldn't seem to catch his breath, and he clutched tightly at Heero, never wanting to let go. He thought he was on the verge of tears. Something fundamental about the world seemed to have shifted during the course of that kiss; somehow, he knew, his life would never be the same again.


	4. Chapter 4

Trowa rather expected Quatre to come sleep with him again after their long exploration of the palace and that strange supper. The loneliness of this place had in no way diminished, and Trowa sincerely doubted that the thought of having sworn to stay forever could make it any better. Surely Quatre must feel it still, again, and desire a companion as he had last night. Or perhaps Trowa was thinking wishfully, letting the loneliness and his desire to have Quatre there get to _him_.

At any rate, Quatre did not at first appear, but it didn't take long to realize why: Trowa, as he walked past the door between their rooms, clearly caught the sound of sobbing from beyond it, and paused.

It wasn't the first time he'd overheard Quatre's solitary despair, but neither was this a frequent occurrence. Quatre had always felt the need to be strong for the sake of his family: to smile and carry on and actively hide how much he was hurt by the loss of his mother, by their poverty, by his father's decline. He'd always been the first to go without whatever was in short supply, he'd always worked the longest hours, and he'd never let them see him grieve over the situation, over his hunger or his weariness... but there had been times when Trowa had come upon him in the woodshed or out with the cows sobbing as quietly as he could.

Observing Quatre in so much pain always brought Trowa to tears as well - in part because it hurt to see Quatre suffering, in part because there was nothing he could do to help him... but also because it was agony to realize that he was one of those from whom Quatre felt the need to hide this. Of course that just marked Trowa as part of the family in Quatre's eyes, but Trowa would rather share in his master's sorrow and give what comfort he could than accept the dubious compliment of Quatre's brave face and false smile over a secret suffering.

And if Trowa had thought things might change here - here, where the sadness of the situation was too obvious to be any kind of secret, and where Trowa was all Quatre had left of his previous life - he was mistaken. Obviously Trowa was still not one to be shared with; Quatre still had to hide. And it still hurt... but at least this was a pain to which Trowa was accustomed.

Brushing the tears from his own face, he moved away from the door, trying not to strain his ears for further sounds of Quatre's sorrow or its abatement as he readied himself for sleep. And a few minutes later, there came a knock. Trowa, who had just gotten into bed but hadn't yet arranged the covers or pulled the curtains, said, "Come in, Quatre."

It would have been impossible to tell he'd been crying - whether because Quatre had mastered the art of doing so in secret or simply because he possessed that natural grace that allowed one person in a hundred to look normal after tears, Trowa didn't know. Quatre just gave Trowa his beautiful smile, this one somewhat abashed as he asked, "Can I sleep with you again?"

Trowa nodded and shifted over in the bed.

"First the inn at Silbreaker, now here," said Quatre ruefully as he moved across the room. "I can't seem to fall asleep by myself anymore. I guess it _has_ been almost three years since I had a bed of my own..."

Trowa replied to the apology in Quatre's tone, assuring Quatre it was all right. He doubted he would be able to fall asleep on his own either.

Once they were settled and the lights had gone out, the familiar warmth of their backs against each other beginning to grow, Quatre said quietly, "Why didn't you tell me you haven't been paid in so long?"

The truth of the matter was that Trowa had never been able to stand the thought of what Quatre might say if he learned this. It had been bad enough having Quatre's father regularly express the opinion that Trowa should leave them, however kindly he meant it... to hear Quatre say it would have broken Trowa's heart.

But the answer he gave was, "I didn't want to worry you."

"It's all water under the bridge now, I guess," said Quatre, "but you deserve better than that."

"Thank you. But room and board were enough for me." As long as that continued to allow him to be near Quatre.

"'Room and board,'" Quatre snorted. "A room you shared with two other people, not even a bed of your own, and board not guaranteed on any given day."

"Like you said, it doesn't matter now."

As silence fell, Trowa had no doubt they were both reflecting on _why_ it didn't matter now. These exceptional new circumstances were something that would surely linger on both their minds for quite some time. Indeed, could they ever become accustomed to this? Trowa knew humans were capable of getting used to the most outrageous things, but this... he thought this might lie beyond the pale. It must always be incredible.

"Why do you think he wants me here?" asked Quatre at last.

"Misery loves company," was Trowa's speculation.

"You think he wants to make others suffer because he's suffering?"

"I don't know. He scares me," admitted Trowa. And it didn't help that the Beast's face and animalistic body language were so difficult to read.

"Mmm." Quatre's tone of agreement seemed equal parts pensive and exhausted. "But I don't think he's really unkind... just... lonely..."

Trowa made a sound that conceded the possibility of this point, after which they spoke no more. He couldn't help wondering, though, as he fell asleep, exactly what the Beast's intentions might be if it was motivated by loneliness.

...

...

...

As quietly and slowly as he could, trying hard not to allow any rustling from the branch he gripped to keep his balance, Heero leaned forward and looked down through the leaves into the shadows below. Moonlight stretched across a long empty patch of ground nearby, and he was sure to mark the moment Duo appeared out of the shade of the trees.

How exactly he came to be up here was something of a mystery to him. Not how he'd actually climbed the tree, but how it was that he so frequently ended up doing silly things like this - _and_ enjoying them - when Duo was around. He'd previously thought himself almost entirely devoid of playful impulses, and yet here he was playing hide-and-seek with another grown man in the middle of the night five miles from home, and knowing he would not regret, later, how he'd spent his time.

Duo was trying as hard as Heero to be sneaky, but it was more difficult when he was moving - and when he had that great length of tightly-braided hair, which he'd just washed, to catch the light and give away his position. Heero, however, was at an equal if dissimilar disadvantage in that he found the sight of Duo in the moonlight - _especially_ with that glint on his wet hair - utterly breathtaking. At the sound Heero thus inadvertently made, Duo's face snapped upward, his mouth split into a grin with a brief flash of moonlight on teeth, and he made a little triumphant noise.

Abandoning all efforts at subtlety, Heero scrambled back down his branch and searched for another path to the ground besides the one Duo was now using to come up. It didn't look promising. His heart beat rapidly in the giddiness that always seemed to overtake him at moments like this - something that came across a lot like genuine fear, despite the fact that he actually very much wanted Duo to catch him, and made him feel like shouting out loud.

He'd managed to move two branches laterally and one down before Duo, far more reckless and simultaneously more experienced at climbing trees than Heero was, caught up with him. He dropped onto Heero's branch and came toward him, that triumphant grin still on his face. For a few breathtaking seconds he walked without holding onto anything before he pushed Heero up against the trunk of the tree and wrapped his arms around both.

"Duo, we'll fall if you-" But Heero was cut off by Duo's mouth hard against his, and his awareness of balance and its importance and his current position in a tree wavered a bit.

A few minutes later they were both seated on the branch, which only creaked a little beneath their combined weight, close together, arms around each other and Duo's head on Heero's shoulder, their legs dangling down into the darkness. There wasn't much of a view - just a largely indistinguishable tangle of black branches and leaves, with here and there at random a patch of green or brown haphazardly illuminated by the moon - but they were perfectly content.

"I've never seen your hair down," Heero was complaining idly. He had Duo's wet braid in one hand, and was swinging it gently around; it had been four months since he'd first set eyes on that braid, and it seemed a trifle unfair that he'd never seen it unbound.

"I'll show you sometime," Duo replied. "But it's not all that exciting."

"Sometime..." echoed Heero, and felt a touch of uneasiness creep into his tone as into his thoughts. He couldn't help contemplating the future at moments like this - their future. More specifically, whether or not they had one.

Duo picked up on his changing mood immediately. "What's wrong?"

"Have you heard of... people like us... before?"

"You mean beautiful geniuses?" Duo wondered with mock seriousness.

"Men together like this," Heero said with real seriousness. He supposed there might possibly be women in such a situation too, but didn't feel the need to add that, as there were no women here. "I've never heard of it."

"Well, _we_ haven't told anyone. Probably neither has anyone else. There could be thousands of people like us, and we just wouldn't know."

This was actually a fairly reassuring point. "I wish we _could_ tell someone, though. I wish we could tell everyone."

"You? 'Tell everyone' something?"

"Just this one thing. They don't need to know anything else. But I _would_ like to tell them how much I love you."

"Would you?"

"I'd climb up onto one of the rooftops in the square and shout it out during the festival if I could."

Duo's face against Heero's neck seemed to have gone hot. "God, would you really do that for me? I think the world would come to an end!"

"Then I probably wouldn't."

With a chuckle, Duo squeezed the arm he had around Heero's waist. "So kind of you to _probably_ refrain from bringing the world to an end." After a long moment of silence he added, as if in afterthought, "I know how you feel, though... I'd like to be able to tell my mother."

"What do you think she'd say?"

Duo removed his head from the crook of Heero's neck and chin and puffed out his cheeks in a long breath. "I haven't the faintest idea. I doubt it'd be good, though... I mean, if you and I are wondering about this, while we're in it - if _we_ can acknowledge that it's unusual, and we're feeling it - I don't know how anyone who's _not_ in the middle of it would react."

"Probably think we'd both gone mad."

Duo nodded glumly. "Right now nobody but my mother even really knows we're friends, since you always come and go after dark. I mean, I've mentioned you to some people, but I haven't tried to make anyone understand how important you are."

"Alan thinks I've found a sweetheart," Heero replied, with a slight smile, knowing Duo would be amused to hear it. "Darl thinks I've found a lover."

"Well, you _have_!" said Duo, a little indignantly, and, turning his head, kissed Heero again.

Heero liked that. Duo was his sweetheart. He was Duo's lover. The words brought a hot, twisting sensation to the pit of his stomach and made him clutch at Duo more tightly. Of course, 'lover' implied something a bit more than 'sweetheart' - something the kind-hearted and somewhat naive Alan wouldn't ascribe to the unmarried Heero, but which his son gladly would. "Darl's been annoyed with me," Heero went on when he could. "I suddenly became social without him. He can't wait to see me in trouble for knocking up some girl."

"There, I think, we have a distinct advantage over tradition," Duo pronounced dogmatically.

Heero seemed to feel all the skin on his body tingle and heat and tighten, and he wanted simultaneously to pull Duo closer and to push him away. "But we haven't even-"

"But we _could_," Duo broke in intensely.

"I don't know." Heero's voice was a little shaky. "I wouldn't have any idea what to do."

"Oh, I bet you'd have _some_ idea," said Duo pointedly. "We figured out kissing, didn't we?"

"But I don't know if..." Heero gave up and let his real objection out. "If we _should_." Helplessly, fearing it might hurt Duo but feeling he had to say it, he went on. "I love you, but sometimes I think it's not right. That something's wrong with me, and we shouldn't be doing this at all. Taking the next step, going that far... I'm afraid it might... I don't know."

With a defeated-sounding sigh, Duo let his head fall back onto Heero's shoulder again. "I know," he said softly. "Sometimes I want you so bad I feel like I'm going to scream, but if all of this is already... unhealthy or something... we'd just be hurting each other more, wouldn't we? Damn it all."

"I'm sorry," Heero whispered. "I wish I could give you something normal and right... or that one of us had been born a woman or something."

"_I_ don't," said Duo fiercely, straightening so abruptly that they were both for a moment in danger of losing their balance. "_I_ don't want to be a woman, and I wouldn't like you to be one either. You being a man is part of who you are, and I love who you are. If some faery came along right now and offered to change one of us into a girl so we could live happily ever after, I'd tell her to fuck off."

So surprised and touched was Heero by this - not to mention just a little amused - that he had nothing to say in response. After a moment Duo settled into him again and added at a grumble, "And don't talk about 'normal and right,' either. Well, all right, maybe this isn't normal. As far as I know, I guess it's not. And I wish I could say there's nothing wrong with it, but I don't know that for sure either. But if it's wrong, it's the rightest-feeling wrong I've ever felt."

Heero had to laugh. "That's one way to put it."

"My point is that I'd rather be wrong with you than right with anyone else."

"That one was a lot more eloquent."

"Hey, I'm trying to make a dramatic romantic statement here, and you're mocking me."

Heero pulled him closer. "I love you, Duo," he murmured into Duo's hair.

"I love you too." Duo's tone was intense as he returned both the declaration and the gesture, squeezing Heero tightly. "I just wish that could be enough."

...

...

...

"I'm going to fatten right up in this place," Quatre said as he sank into a chair at the breakfast table and gave the latter's contents a look of appreciative helplessness. "And wine with _every meal_...?"

"We'll get some exercise exploring today," Trowa reminded him, moving around from where he'd held Quatre's chair to take his own. He had nothing to offer on the subject of the wine, however, so he just added, "You don't think the Beast _intends_ to fatten us up, do you?"

Quatre paused with his first bite of potatoes halfway to his mouth, looking as if the idea had never even occurred to him. "No," he said at last, "I don't. I can see how 'I'm going to eat you' _could_ be expressed as 'Stay with me forever,' but he doesn't seem the type for that kind of word game. Besides, I was looking at him last night, and I don't think he's built to eat meat. He doesn't have the teeth for it."

"Now _you're_ being reassuringly mundane," Trowa said with a slight smile.

"Good," said Quatre. "Because I'm not entirely certain I believe it myself."

Trowa gave a brief, bitter laugh, then turned his full attention to breakfast.

When they'd finished eating - and Quatre for all his complaints had done justice to the exquisite meal - Quatre declared, "Now I'm going to use one of those wonderful-looking washrooms. It's been a long time since I had a real bath."

Well aware of this, as every moment Quatre spent unclothed for whatever purpose was carefully cataloged in the back of his head, Trowa just nodded.

"So I'll meet you back here in about an hour," Quatre went on, "and we'll go explore outside."

Once he was alone, Trowa reflected that he might as well seek out a bath of his own, given the excessive number of washrooms they'd seen yesterday and the fact that sitting here thinking about Quatre bathing wasn't going to do him any sort of good. Less enthusiastically than Quatre had, he rose and left the parlor, and inquired of the candles on the corridor wall the way to the nearest unoccupied washroom.

That this contained every imaginable amenity that could assist in bathing, Trowa was in no way surprised. That every substance smelled of roses, Trowa was in no way surprised. That he rather enjoyed the experience of complete submersion in hot water - something, as Quatre had pointed out, that was rarely available to him these days - and eventually left the room feeling refreshed and ready for the day, he might have been a little surprised.

Back in his bedroom, as he was reaching for the clothing that had again reappeared, folded neatly, on his tightly-made bed, he was struck suddenly with the thought that, if he was to wander around a palace for the rest of his life, there was no reason to continue dressing like the pauper he therefore no longer was. So he left his rough, worn garments sitting on the bed for now, and moved to the wardrobe.

He didn't know whether the palace was aware, somehow, of what colors he preferred, or whether it was just by coincidence that everything in here was silver and dark green and brown; but even just pulling some of the items halfway out to glance at them proved that they should all fit him. It was a little unnerving, actually, and the more he looked through the available clothing the less he felt inclined to wear any of it. It would be, he thought, a sign of his acceptance of this situation and his future here, and he wasn't sure he was ready for that. So when Quatre entered, Trowa was lacing up his old, worn boots again beneath his mended trousers, scratchy shirt, and patched tunic.

"I'm glad you're here, Trowa," Quatre said, the touch of sadness in his tone lending credence to his words despite their sounding otherwise mostly cheerful. "This place is beautiful, but having something familiar around is a huge relief."

Trowa was glad then that he'd retained his familiar outfit, even if it hadn't been for this reason. What he said in response, though, was, "So I'm just familiar, not beautiful?"

Quatre laughed. "Come on; let's go explore outside."

They started their sight-seeing down near the silent temptation that was the open front gates, where Trowa couldn't help wondering if there was anything magical actually keeping Quatre here. Would the gates swing closed again if they approached? Would the Beast then come bounding out of the palace once more and ask whether Quatre was tired of this place already and wanted to die?

Quatre's thoughts seemed to be running along the same lines, though not quite so dismally. "I guess he trusts me," he murmured, looking out the arch in the hedge-wall to the forest road beyond.

On one side of the gravel, in the northeastern corner of the grounds, lined by hedges, there was a great green space where the grass was cropped low as if by extremely diligent servants. In one corner there stood a stone shed, which they hadn't noticed from any of the windows yesterday - probably because it was covered in creeping vines and roses that caused it to blend in somewhat with the greenery against which it stood. Inside they found various sporting articles: balls and bats and nets and racquets for playing all manner of games, which were evidently meant to be enjoyed out on the smooth lawn. It was an interesting discovery, and not bad for the very beginning of their day's exploration.

"We'll have to remember this," Quatre said, running a calculating eye over a set of tenpins in a corner.

Opposite this, to the south of the gravel, stood a garden full of tiered beds of flowers with benches set among them, shaded by well-placed and meticulously-groomed trees. Trowa thought the effect would have been better if the flowers had been anything other than the ubiquitous roses; these even grew, impossibly, on the trees, which otherwise he would have thought to be maple of some kind.

An arch led westward to a tiled courtyard with a small fountain set into the hedge-wall on one side and more benches similar to those in the previous space. The fountain was shaped of white marble to resemble a small natural waterfall (which looked a little odd in that green, rose-dotted setting) being enjoyed by some ducks that had, like everything else, been carved in exquisite detail in their various acts of splashing and fluttering.

There seemed to be a woodland theme to this courtyard, in fact; there were other statues here and there, in the corners and against the benches, of deer and raccoons and foxes, and even, on one of the seats, a butterfly so delicately wrought out of the same stone that Trowa thought it must snap off and fall to pieces if it was touched. And he wondered who it was that had decided the palace needed more beasts around.

Across from there, adjacent to the sporting green, was another courtyard, this one apparently specifically for the purpose of outdoor lunch parties. It was full of little tables with two or three chairs each, all in sturdy wrought iron that could outlast weather (not that the lifespan of any particular material was probably much of an issue in this place), and on one side stood a sort of sideboard of the same. "We'll have to eat out here sometime," Quatre observed.

The gravel road formed a sort of upside-down teardrop shape in front of the palace's entrance for the sake of carriages Trowa couldn't imagine ever visiting, and inside the resulting central loop was a grove of trees. Like those in the gardens, these were pruned into neat, upward-sweeping shapes, and they were were surrounded by rose-bushes. A small opening in the latter led into a surprisingly private enclosed space where a couple of benches stood facing each other and whence very little of the rest of the grounds could be seen.

On the south side of the gravel again, adjacent to the stable-yard, they found a riding yard whose dirt floor was immaculately free of weeds despite its being God-knew-how-long since any horse had been exercised there. Obviously reminded by the thought of horses, Quatre said soberly, "I wonder how things are going at home. I guess I shouldn't say 'at home' anymore, though, should I?" He sighed, then amended firmly, "How things are going in Beaulea."

"At the pace those horses were going..." Trowa tried to estimate the timeframe, but wasn't familiar enough with the distance to do so. "They're probably there by now."

Slowly, sadly, Quatre smiled. "I just wish I could have seen their faces when they saw all those things in the bags."

A fabulous orchard was their next destination, on the north side of the gravel again and adjacent to the courtyard with the many tables. It seemed to have been planted with variety rather than convenience in mind - Trowa would have pitied the servants set to harvest such a diverse crop, if there had been any - for the trees bore fruit of every imaginable kind. They also bore roses, like everything else around here, and it was exceptionally strange to see the flowers alongside apples, pears, cherries, oranges, and others more exotic and less easy to recognize, and to find thorns on the stems. What they picked idly and tasted, though, sitting in an elegant little gazebo with cushioned seats that stood among the trees, tasted healthy and delicious.

Back on the south side, beyond the riding yard and sharing one wall with the stables, there stood a coach-house entirely devoid of any sort of equipage, which was, like everything else, in disconcertingly good repair for something so unused and undoubtedly old. They didn't spend long there, but entered a space beyond that was so obviously a kitchen-yard, despite the absence of chickens or washlines or loafing scullery children, that they began immediately looking around for the kitchen door.

They found it just as quickly, and so detoured indoors for a while again: down a flight of stairs to where a spacious and well-equipped basement kitchen looked uncannily pristine and a number of other chambers obviously designed for the use and housing of servants were, as Trowa had predicted last night, empty. On the level beneath this, its plain dirt floor attesting to its being finally the lowest, some unused storage rooms gave way to a neatly-ordered wine cellar that seemed to stretch across the entire remaining width of the palace.

"No wonder," Quatre breathed as they walked slowly down one of the many lanes of floor-to-ceiling racks filled with endless dark bottles. The air was damp and a little chilly, and there was a strangeness to it that Trowa did not at first recognize. After his next few footsteps stirred the scent of earth and sent it rising to his nostrils, however, he realized that this was the first place he'd been within the palace grounds - from the front gate to the stables to the top of that unnerving tower - that did not smell like roses. _They_ smelled like roses, but for once it was not predominant.

It seemed they were about to turn back by a silent mutual consent, as there could be little of interest amidst these endless racks of wine; but just then one of the torches ahead of them - which, true to form, had been scrupulously lighting their path as they moved - dimly cast its luminance, as it came to life, on a wall containing a door some distance ahead. Quatre made a noise of curiosity and moved toward it, and Trowa was not averse to following.

The purpose of the small room they entered was not immediately apparent. Its only furnishings were a sort of wooden trough in one corner and an empty bucket, and at an initial glance there seemed to be nothing more remarkable about the space than that. But a second glance showed that the earthen floor had been disturbed across half the room, that there were markings in the loose dirt. Both men moved slowly forward, and Trowa heard Quatre's breath catch as they drew close enough, and into a proper angle, to see the words that had clearly been scratched into the floor by great bird-like talons:

_I COULD NEVER FORGET YOU._

Trowa shivered, suddenly cold for no discernible reason. Though he was staring at the words in the ground, he was hearing words that had been spoken aloud yesterday: _"If you're ever tired of this place and want to die, tell me; I'll kill you quickly."_

"We shouldn't be here," Quatre said in a choked voice.

"No." The soft, growling tone from behind startled both of them into a quick-drawn breath, and they whirled to find the Beast dark against the even darker doorway. "This is your home now," it went on coolly. "Nowhere is forbidden."

"But..." Quatre sounded apologetic. "This is your room, isn't it?"

The Beast nodded. "But you're welcome to come here."

Perhaps given confidence by this statement, though he still spoke deferentially, Quatre asked, "What does it mean?" And he gestured at the message on the ground.

The Beast raised one padded hand, extended the claws briefly, then dropped it again to his side. "It's impossible for me to use a pen," it explained briefly, emotionlessly. "Sometimes I write my thoughts here."

"And this thought?" Quatre wondered, sounding almost breathless with interest. "_Whom_ could you never forget?"

For a long, silent moment the Beast stared at them both with its expressionless face. Then, abruptly turning, it vanished into the darkness of the cellar beyond. When they followed it a few moments later, there was no sign it had been there.

Quietly resuming their exploration once they were out in the sunlight again, they moved past the kitchen-yard into another grassy court off of which another little staircase led down to a door into the first cellar. A hedge, running from the outer hedge-wall to the stone wall of the palace, blocked further progress toward the rear of the latter, but just as they were about to turn back and explore in another direction they noticed an opening in this, beside the juncture of the two hedges and nearly invisible. When they drew close, they found a wrought-iron gate set deep within, like the front gate and equally immovable when closed.

Huddled together in the arch against this gate, they peered as best they could at what they could make out of the space beyond. It seemed to be just another yard, perhaps a bit wilder than those they'd seen thus far: tall grass, longer than seemed to be the standard around here but still neat and even, grew all around some kind of stone block like a table or dais in the center, and clinging vines covered the structure in uneven lines. That was all, however; the yard had no other features. Still, a good half of the space was invisible from here; perhaps there was something of greater interest past-

"There's someone in there!" Quatre gasped suddenly.

"Where?" Trowa wondered, startled. "The Beast?"

"No, look, on the dais. All covered in roses - someone's lying there!"

It was difficult to tell from this angle, and those self-same roses made it nearly impossible, but as Trowa looked more carefully, he thought he could see what Quatre meant: there were touches of color, beneath the vines, that might have been clothing, and the overall shape could have been that of a human figure.

Quatre rattled the gate, but it proved as unyielding as before. Then he stood back, frowning at it thoughtfully. Shaking his head, Trowa tried to draw him away; it was obvious they couldn't get in.

As if reading his thoughts, Quatre protested, "No! 'Nowhere is forbidden,' remember?"

"It doesn't need to be forbidden if we can't get in."

Quatre shook his head. "Come on." He turned, and Trowa followed him down the stairs into the building. In one of the pantries they'd explored earlier the lights immediately came on, and these Quatre addressed: "Can you show us how to get into that yard just outside? It looks like it's possibly the southwesternmost one?"

The candles twinkled in what Trowa could swear was eager acquiescence, and a distance off, closer to the door into the corridor, another pair sprang to life in the by-now-familiar pattern of beckoning and leading.

A staircase put them up on the ground floor inside the system of narrow servants' hallways they'd seen the first night; thence they were drawn around tight little corners and down more constricted corridors that ran among many of the great rooms, then through a door that unexpectedly led them outside again.

Between the back of the palace and the outer hedge there was nothing more than a grassy lane leading off a great, straight, unbroken distance in either direction, and the hedge-wall itself was so high that the space felt much like a tunnel as a result: lonely, shadowed, chilly in a whistling breeze. But if the lights were to be believed, this was the way to their destination, so accordingly they went. And down at the end, once they'd reached the southwestern corner of the building, they found what they were looking for in the form of another hedge with an arched opening. This one had no gate, and when they stepped through it they found themselves in the little courtyard they'd previously viewed from the other side.

The yard's only feature was, in fact, a plain stone dais of the same sparkling reddish stone as the palace, though it lacked the carvings most of the other stonework bore; perhaps the roses were meant to compensate for that. And there was, in fact, someone lying on top of it.

He was young - about their age, it appeared - and clad in fine but relatively simple garments that looked as if they could have come out of a wardrobe here at the palace. Even motionless and with eyes closed, his face was pleasant and friendly. His hands were folded across his breast like a corpse's, and beneath them he held the end of the long braid into which his chestnut hair had been gathered and which was draped over his shoulder onto his chest. And all across his body from head to toe the roses had grown, winding snakelike paths over face and torso and legs, criss-crossing in a pattern of deep green dotted with color.

"I think I've been dreaming about him," Quatre said softly, "the last couple of nights."

The words snagged something out of a hidden memory, and Trowa nodded. "So have I. Him and... someone else..." He could not quite remember.

Cautiously Quatre moved closer to the still figure on the dais. "Do you think he's dead?" he murmured, reaching out.

Instead of answering the question, Trowa reminded him, "Careful of the roses."

Very gently, Quatre brushed aside part of a leafy vine and touched the man's face; then he withdrew his hand abruptly as if from a flame, though the man did not stir. "He's warm," he hissed.

"Asleep?" Trowa wondered uncertainly.

"But for how long?" Quatre's eyes flicked over the flourishing vinework.

Trowa shook his head.

"And why are we dreaming about him?" Quatre's voice dropped to a pensive murmur. "I wish I could remember what _happened_ in those dreams..." Quoting Trowa from moments before he added, "Him and... someone else..." Then his head snapped up like a hunting dog scenting the wind (though here it would smell nothing but roses), and he turned abruptly. He said nothing, only began moving suddenly, quickly, out of the little courtyard and down the long, chilly grass corridor beyond. There was something about his abrupt, animal-like movements that reminded Trowa a little of the Beast, and he followed closely in some agitation.

Upon reaching the palace's northwestern corner, Quatre's instincts were proven right when they entered another courtyard identical to the first - including a plain stone dais and a sleeping man.

Trowa was a little worried at how well Quatre knew this place already. "Why did you think this would be here?" he wondered uneasily. But Quatre just shook his head and moved toward the dais, so Trowa continued to follow, and stood beside him looking down.

This sleeper had a distinctively beautiful face, with thick lashes hiding his closed eyes, and messy short hair so dark a brown it was almost black. And he had definitely featured in those dreams Trowa could not quite remember, alongside the one with the braid.

"Who do you think they are?" Quatre wondered quietly.

Trowa made the first speculation that came to mind: "The last people who picked the Beast's roses?"

With a slight shiver, Quatre built on the hypothesis. "And they swore to stay here forever, but eventually they couldn't take the loneliness and just lay down and went to sleep."

And wandered thence into the dreams of the newest rose prisoners, Trowa finished mentally. It was not a heartening idea.

"It's as good a guess as any, I suppose... and probably the best we're going to get, since I can almost guarantee the Beast won't answer any questions about them."

"Oh, you noticed that too?" Trowa wondered dryly.

"I'm sure he must be under some kind of spell," Quatre said. "You've heard stories about curses that won't let you talk about them, right?"

Trowa nodded; it made too much sense to deny.

"And these men have something to do with it too."

"And so do we, now."

They took one last uncertain look at the sleeper before turning to leave. As they headed back down the narrow lane to the door by which they'd left the palace, Quatre remarked, "I wonder why we didn't notice them through any of the windows yesterday."

"Maybe the palace didn't want us to."

Slowly Quatre nodded. "Those yards do feel more... secret... more private, maybe, than the rest of the grounds."

Wordlessly after this, Trowa followed Quatre, not sure where they were going. Inside, up some stairs, out of the servants' corridors, into a larger hallway Quatre moved with purpose, but then he slowed, stopped, and looked around vaguely. Patiently Trowa waited for him to declare his intentions.

"I just can't stop thinking about that trough and that bucket down in that cellar," was what Quatre said at last, unexpectedly. _Trowa_ had been thinking about the sleeping men, and wondered by what train of thought Quatre had been brought back to the Beast. "That's what he meant when he said he can't eat in a fancy dining room: he eats like an animal. Do you think he was once a man?"

"Maybe." It was just like Quatre to pity the Beast so much after only a day and a half. Sardonically Trowa added, "Why don't you ask him?"

Quatre laughed a little. "Let's go have lunch in that balcony room next to the greenhouse again."

"If we can find it," Trowa agreed. As he'd rather expected, a couple of candles flared up ahead of them at these words, clearly offering to guide them. Trowa was getting the hang of this place too - though, thankfully or otherwise, he wasn't yet so attuned that he could anticipate the presence and location of sleeping men from half-remembered dreams.

As they followed the lights onto the second-floor landing that stretched across the entrance hall, Trowa felt Quatre suddenly grip his arm. Swiftly following his other, pointing hand, Trowa's eyes fell on a very distinctly human figure standing at the head of the stairs that led down to the ground floor. He thought he saw brown hair, some garments of burgundy and gold - he _definitely_ saw the glint of scholar's spectacles as the figure threw a glance back at them - but otherwise, the stranger's militaristic stride down the steps was too quick for him to catch any more details.

"Wait!" Quatre was calling. "Please wait!" He'd released Trowa's arm and hastened forward, and Trowa jogged after him. But by the time they reached the spot whence the figure had moved out of sight, and looked down the stairs, there was no sign of anyone else in the hall.

"This place is full of mysteries," Quatre frowned.

"Was that who you saw last night?" Trowa wondered.

Quatre, who had been turning this way and that as if he might find some hint of the stranger if only he looked hard enough, finally stopped. "Last night's was definitely a woman," he said with a shake of his head.

"So we have a number of people around," Trowa said, taking Quatre by the arm and drawing him away from the stairs and back onto their path, "none of whom we can talk to."

"Maybe they're _all_ under enchantments," speculated Quatre. "Maybe this is a place where enchanted people gather." More lightly, though he didn't exactly sound _pleased_ with his facetious idea, he added, "I wonder what our enchantments are..."

Trowa was even less pleased with the idea, and couldn't help dwelling on it a little as they continued moving toward the third floor and their lunch. If they were each under an enchantment, Trowa certainly knew what _his_ was; but what Quatre's might be he didn't like to think.


	5. Chapter 5

When it was obvious after a few nights that Trowa really, honestly didn't mind Quatre invading his bed, Quatre stopped apologizing - and after four or five days stopped even asking; it simply became routine. Soon the palace seemed to grow aware of this, for eventually the bed disappeared out of Quatre's room and was replaced by a divan. The palace was good at noticing and adjusting to their ways; after about the same amount of time, the door in Quatre's room that had previously opened onto a little parlor he'd never used led instead into the washroom he preferred.

Additionally, they started having fruit juices offered with breakfast instead of wine, if the breakfasts themselves were just as hearty. Though Quatre had complained about the amount of irresistibly delicious food that appeared before them on a regular basis, a large breakfast was desirable, as the Beast continued to be present at supper and generally kill their appetites.

During their seventh supper in the palace he came bounding in as usual, jumped onto the same chair he nearly always occupied, and said, "So it's been a week!"

Quatre was a little surprised at this; the Beast thus far had tended to avoid referring directly to the fact that Quatre was supposed to stay here for the rest of his life, instead mostly asking questions about Quatre's past and his family and even occasionally attempting (generally unsuccessfully) to interrogate Trowa on similar subjects.

"It has," Quatre agreed.

"A whole week, and you haven't found the children's yard yet!"

"Children's yard?" echoed Quatre, and threw a glance at Trowa to ask if he knew what the Beast was referring to. Trowa just shook his head.

"You explored pretty well," the Beast allowed, "but you missed that one somehow."

"It's probably on the north side." Quatre made very sure to address Trowa as he said this. "I bet it's right next to the northwest courtyard, and we didn't find it because we were distracted on the other side of the building by the sleeping men." Unable to restrain himself, despite having a fairly good idea what would happen, he'd asked the Beast a couple of evenings ago about the sleepers, and the Beast had made some transparent excuse and left the room; Quatre didn't want to drive him out again.

The Beast did shift a little in his chair at Quatre's remark, but it was difficult to tell whether this was because of what Quatre had said or simply because the Beast could rarely sit still through supper. "But then you've hardly been outside since then!" he said.

"It's been raining," Quatre protested. "We've spent most of our time reading."

"Well, you need to see it. Come outside with me after supper, and I'll show you."

"Isn't it still raining?" Quatre didn't like the idea of flatly denying the Beast's request, but he also didn't think well of heading out into a storm very much like the one that had brought them here, such as had occurred yesterday evening.

"I like the rain!"

"Running around in the rain is a good way to catch cold. Probably even more for you, with all that fur." Even as he said this, Quatre blanched a little. He was becoming gradually more at ease in the Beast's presence, given that in seven days his host had not made even the smallest attempt to eat him, but he wasn't sure that such remarks on the Beast's person were acceptable. In fact, the Beast's nature and the reason for his monstrous shape and manlike abilities was the subject that would most quickly force him to leave the room - and, though Quatre hadn't asked a question just now, perhaps even mentioning the fur might spoil the evening.

But the Beast just shifted again in his chair and said, "I've never been sick in my life. But I think it's stopped raining, anyway."

After a quick look at Trowa, who shrugged slightly, Quatre said, "I guess we could come out and see it, if it's not too wet."

The Beast made a growling noise of pleasure.

As usual under the Beast's eye, Quatre found himself having difficulties eating, and began mulling over what, exactly, he thought about his enigmatic new acquaintance. He was certainly still frightened of him, frightened of offending him again and what the consequences might be - but just as certainly interested in him and his situation. Curiosity and pity drove him to take the Beast's feelings - whatever they might be - into consideration where otherwise he might _deliberately_ have asked questions to drive the Beast from the room.

It was a strange contrast, a strange circumstance. And now he had accepted the Beast's proposal of venturing out into the wet evening in a similarly torn state of mind: half a good-natured willingness to see what the Beast had to show him, and half a fearful disinclination to refuse.

After a while the Beast started making impatient noises, and got down off his chair to move restlessly around the room - probably because Quatre and Trowa were only picking at their food, an action based on nervousness that was only worsened by the Beast's all-fours pacing; they really might as well just declare the meal finished. A look between the two of them expressing agreement on the subject, they took their last bites and drinks and moved to rise.

"Aha!" said the Beast, and headed for one of the doors. Quatre, marveling at himself, couldn't help smiling at this show of enthusiasm.

They followed him out of the dining room and through the corridors of the palace. As on the first day, he was too quick for them to keep up with properly without running, but, unlike on the first day, he kept bounding back toward them whenever he got too far ahead, resembling an eager dog on a walk.

It had indeed stopped raining, they found as they left the palace by the great front doors and began crossing the fountain courtyard. The air still felt and smelled very wet, however, and it was not unpleasantly cool. As Quatre had guessed, their destination was on the north side of the gravel road and was probably adjacent to the northern sleeper's courtyard. And on entering, he was immediately glad that they _hadn't_ found their way here during their exploration; they'd had enough turbulent discoveries that second day without adding this one.

Not that the place was inherently unpleasant: on the contrary, it was quite charming, with its wrought-iron framework from which two swings hung, its child-sized table and chairs of the same material, its metal slide fixed firmly to the grassy ground, and its neatly-built playhouse. It was, in fact, a little _too_ pleasant, and Quatre's thoughts flew immediately to the younger of his sisters and how they would have loved it - especially that miniature house.

He knew without even the faintest doubt that, even if they happened to live in such a place as this - an enormous palace with every possible amenity and numberless fine things - the girls would still be drawn to this little house, because it would be their size, and they could pretend they were agents unto themselves in its maintenance and administration. He'd been away from them now for three weeks, and, while he wasn't yet fully inured to the idea of never seeing them again, he was growing hardier; but he was glad he hadn't seen this during his first couple of days here.

"I love this place," the Beast said as the two humans took in the view. He bounded up the slide with a clattering noise and crouched on the top, looking around happily like a dog that had conquered a rubbish heap. "Everything's covered with roses everywhere else, and I have to be too careful."

He leaped from the slide a good distance through the air to land on the little table, which rocked under him so precariously that he was forced to leap once more, flying about the same distance again to the roof of the playhouse. The latter creaked as his weight hit it, and Quatre wondered how often he'd done this, and whether it had ever broken beneath him and then been repaired by the usual magic. From the house the Beast leaped next to the swing framework, which also shuddered as his great bulk perched on top of it like a huge bird and his taloned feet clung. Thence he jumped back to the top of the slide.

As Quatre watched in some surprised amusement this vigorous activity of the Beast's, he noticed that there really _weren't_ any roses here except for the ones in the surrounding hedges; he supposed he could understand, then, if the Beast wanted exercise (in a relatively suitable, outdoor setting), why this place was a favorite of his. Why he'd been so eager to show it to them was less easy to comprehend; perhaps it was simply because it was the last place in palace or grounds they hadn't yet seen.

The Beast was making the rounds of the equipment again in a sort of don't-touch-the-ground game he played all alone. He slipped a few times, so great was his speed, but he only laughed, twisting around in the air like a cat to land on his feet, didn't appear to take any harm from it, and was off again. He seemed very much like a child himself as he took advantage of this children's area, and Quatre found himself smiling as he watched. The Beast had never been the most elegant of creatures, but this so blatantly undignified display tipped the scales, just at the moment, from 'inelegant' to 'absurd.'

There was, in fact, as always about the Beast, an appearance of having been very badly put together. Even if all of his body parts had seemed to come from the same animal, Quatre thought, he would still have looked unnatural. Which just made it more uncanny that he moved so easily. His movements weren't exactly harmonious to the eye, but they fulfilled their intended purpose with no apparent handicap brought about by his strange shape, and must therefore be perfectly fitting and sufficient.

As the Beast crouched and stretched and flew through the air from point to point, some of these above the humans' heads, Quatre also noticed - it was not really appropriate, but he couldn't help it - that the creature didn't seem to be possessed of the usual organs of manhood. He had that long hair hiding the area, it was true, but his current activities made it plain that he was not human in that sense any more than in any other. Quatre wondered if this was a source of unhappiness to him. If the Beast had once been human, it surely must be. But of course Quatre would never know, because obviously it was out of the question to ask, and the Beast undoubtedly wouldn't tell him anyway.

Presently Quatre noticed Trowa moving; his friend was beginning to make a cautious way toward the shuddering swing-frame, giving the Beast's circular path a fairly wide berth until he came within range of it again to take a seat on one of the swings. Quatre admired him for his bravery when the Beast was still using the swing-frame as a target in his game, which must be unnerving to be sitting right beneath, and decided he could do no less. He followed Trowa's steps and was soon seated beside him on the other swing, which had had most of the rainwater shaken off it by the Beast's comings and goings, and which jolted regularly every time the Beast landed on top.

Quatre gripped the chains to either side of his face and continued watching the Beast in silence. He flinched every time the Beast came around this way, but it grew less with each repetition; and the amusing nature of the Beast's antics helped to calm his nervousness as well. Soon he was smiling again as he watched the Beast land on the slide, scramble a little for balance, and leap again to the little table, which always threatened to fall over onto its side but never quite did. The playhouse crunched and rattled under the great dark talons, and then the Beast was overhead, making the whole world seem to shake.

The Beast appeared to take a fierce, intense, focused pleasure in this activity, strange and repetitive though it was, and Quatre thought that, strange and repetitive though it was, it was good to see. Trowa seemed to agree; he watched, in any case, with evident interest just as great, and Quatre thought he caught the hint of a smile on his friend's face from time to time.

Finally, though, the Beast finished with his play; instead of jumping from the swing-frame to the slide, he hit the turf just in front of them with a thud, causing both Trowa and Quatre to start back. Looking pleased with himself, the Beast sat before them on his haunches, chest rising and falling visibly in the moonlight. "See why this place is so great?" he panted.

Quatre nodded.

"I like to come here at night," the Beast went on. "For exercise and to look at the moon." Quatre thought that this was the happiest he'd seen him yet. He also thought that, if jumping around on play-yard equipment in the dark by himself was the Beast's idea of a good time, it was no wonder he seemed so painfully lonely.

"It's fantastic." Quatre felt that some verbal agreement was called for, which was why he said this aloud. "My sisters would love it."

"All of them? I thought you said some were closer to your age."

"Well, my youngest few," Quatre admitted. "Elyss and Mad, at least, and maybe Merci too. Even at our estate we didn't have things like this for children. We had a swing in a tree on the grounds, but this is all much better. In Beaulea, there's nothing. Not even free time to use this sort of thing, even if it was there."

After this statement, a fairly lengthy silence fell as the Beast's breathing gradually returned to normal. Now he looked a little uncomfortable, as he sometimes did when Quatre talked about the dire situation of his family. Quatre was certain that, glad though the Beast was to have them here, he still felt guilty about extracting that promise from Quatre and stealing him from a family that needed him. And it occurred to Quatre to wonder -

"Do you _have_ to take a life for every rose that's picked?" Actually he hadn't meant to ask aloud; it had simply slipped out the moment the thought crossed his mind. So he decided that, as long as he'd already possibly alienated the Beast, he might as well press on. "I mean, are you compelled by magic? Or is it something you do by choice?"

Just as he'd feared, the Beast drew himself up in that repressive way Quatre was already beginning to be familiar with. "Well, now you've seen the courtyard," he said. "You can sometimes find me here at night, if you want me. But I'm done for now, so I'll say good night to you both!" And he whirled so that his tail curled momentarily around him, and bounded away through the opening in the hedge onto the main grounds and out of sight.

Quatre and Trowa, sitting side-by-side on the metal swings, stared after him for a few moments. There was always a feeling of forlornness left over, Quatre thought, when the Beast departed like that. So many things here were a mystery, their host not the least. He sighed.

"Do you remember," Trowa said quietly, unexpectedly, "when we used to push each other on that tree-swing at the estate?"

Forlornness or no, Quatre had to smile. "For _hours_," he said. He rocked the swing on which he sat back and forth a little, but it was too close to the ground for any comfortable actual swinging with his adult legs. "We never got tired of it." Of course Trowa, as a servant, wouldn't have had the luxury of pleading tiredness to stop such an activity... but Quatre thought he'd been just as happy to waste entire afternoons at it as Quatre had.

"I wonder if he ever gets tired of this place," Trowa murmured.

"Of course he does," was Quatre's immediate reply. "Remember what he said the first day? That it's not unlikely that I'll get tired enough of it to want to die?"

Trowa said nothing, only looked darkly in the direction the Beast had gone.

After a few silent minutes of scuffing his feet in the short grass, Quatre finally stood up. "Let's go to bed," he said. Though he was less weary in body than on previous nights by the time supper was done, life here was proving rather taxing to the mind.

Trowa nodded, and joined him standing; and together they walked in contemplative silence back into the palace and up to their rooms.

...

...

...

"I told you so," said Duo, still a little breathless as he settled close up against Heero under the starlight. In the warm air of a windless night in late summer, their sweat was cooling only slowly, and if Duo felt the prickling grass uncomfortable under his damp, bare skin, he didn't remark upon it; Heero himself was only vaguely aware of it.

"People who say that deserve to be hit in the face." Heero made this reply entirely without irritation; as a matter of fact, the words came out sounding rather more lazy than anything else.

"So hit me."

"I was going to," Heero responded, his tone unchanged, "but my hand won't move."

"Your hand _is_ moving." And now that Duo pointed this out, Heero noticed it: one hand was running slowly up and down Duo's side in an almost unconscious lingering caress. He made an indifferent noise, and Duo laughed faintly. "But anyway, I told you so."

With a defeated smile in spite of himself, Heero asked, "What did you tell me?"

"That you'd be able to figure this out."

"You did your share of figuring."

"And pretty expertly, if I do say so myself!" This statement of false arrogance seemed designed solely to render more casual and natural the ensuing question, "What did _you_ think?"

"I thought," said Heero, closing his eyes the better to revel in the sensation of so much of Duo's skin against so much of his, "it's like you said: if this is wrong, it's the rightest-feeling wrong I've ever felt."

Duo chuckled. "You're never going to let me forget that, are you?"

"I'm quoting you in all honesty," Heero protested. "If we're damned because of this, we might as well do it a thousand times more."

"I _would_ remind you what _I_ think of people who talk about being 'damned' because of stuff, but I'm so happy with that suggestion that I can't." Duo stretched out his neck and kissed Heero's face several times before Heero turned it and met Duo's lips with his own. It was awkward in this position, but no less sweet for that.

When they broke apart with a mutual sigh of satisfaction and Duo's face came to rest again against Heero's shoulder, Heero leaned his head back a little so as to look at the stars. They seemed very big and bright and close tonight, as if they'd gathered in to watch. Somehow Heero couldn't even dislike the idea of so many witnesses to what he and Duo had done here when those witnesses were so eternal, so celestial, and so apparently neutral. The stars never declared judgment; they looked just as silently, and shone down just as brightly, on saints and sinners alike.

Of course that returned him to the idea, constantly lurking in the recesses of his mind for all he tried to destroy it, that he might indeed be a sinner - perhaps of the worst kind - might have compromised his soul, might have dragged Duo down with him. It was maddening; the idea itself was maddening, the fact that he still entertained it at all perhaps even more so.

"You deserve better than this," he muttered.

"Better than what?"

"Better than me doubting all the time. I wish I could be as confident as you seem to be."

Duo laughed sadly. "I wish I could be as confident as I seem to be too."

Heero echoed the melancholy sound. "I hope you know, though, that it's not _you_... I'm still doubting, but it's not you personally I'm concerned about. Everything about you, about being with you... being together may not be right, but being with _you_ is... I'm not making sense."

"No, I know what you mean. This may not be right, but I'm having a hard time thinking that anything about being with _you_ is wrong."

"I'm starting to think that, even if it is, it's absolutely worth it."

"I'm not sure if that's a compliment or what."

"That I'd rather be smiled on by you than by God? I think that's pretty clear." After Heero said this, Duo was silent for what felt like a very long time, and Heero started to fear that he might have hurt or offended him. "I know you don't like the idea of God," he began more quietly. "I'm-"

Duo interrupted him. "No, don't apologize." He hugged Heero more tightly. "I was joking. It doesn't matter what I think about God... that's still a pretty serious compliment."

"Good." Relieved, Heero also tightened his grip on Duo.

"So why don't we do this: since we're not going to stop any time soon - because I'm sure as Hell not giving you up, and it seems like you feel the same way - and we've decided we think this is worth whatever the consequences might be, let's try to stop worrying about it."

Again Heero had to laugh morosely. "Easier said than done."

"But we can try, right? Nobody's ever _told_ us this is wrong; we've just been assuming, because it's something we've never heard of before, something that usually isn't done as far as we know. So why shouldn't we try to get over believing that and just be happy?"

Duo's logic was cheering, as were most of the things Duo said under most circumstances, but Heero felt that he had to point out, "Nobody could possibly tell us this is wrong. Nobody knows."

"I might not believe them anyway if they did," Duo declared. "Who are they to tell us how to live our lives?"

"Well," said Heero reluctantly, "that's getting into..." He trailed off without completing the thought, though; the last thing he wanted was to start a debate with Duo over God's mortal representatives that were supposedly precisely qualified, and, indeed, specifically called to tell others how to live their lives. Instead he said, with a greater resolve, "But I think you're right. We're going to stay together no matter what it does to us. Worrying about it won't change anything. So we might as well try not to worry."

Duo nodded emphatically against Heero's shoulder, then kissed it. Heero finally looked away from the stars at his lover again, taking in what he could from this angle of the faint light from above on Duo's glistening skin. Once more they were silent for some time, and Heero felt, along with the warmth of Duo's breath against his flesh, a certain tension inside him gradually easing. No matter what were his thoughts on the matter as a whole, it was wonderful to be here with Duo, to think back on how Duo had just made him feel, to anticipate being with Duo forever more. And the decision to continue simply enjoying that without reference to the unknown right or wrong of the situation - even if, as he'd said before, it was a difficult thing to bring himself to do - was already coming as a release of sorts.

Heero's hand, running over Duo's side and back again, deviated slightly from its pattern and found the end of his braid where it lay in the grass. He picked it up and began idly stroking it against Duo's skin, causing Duo to squirm a little as if it tickled. "You're so beautiful," Heero murmured.

"That's not usually a word you apply to men," Duo protested, writhing more pointedly under the soft end of his own hair.

"There are other things men don't usually apply to other men," Heero replied softly. "I haven't heard you complaining about them."

"Actually, I think we just had a long conversa- aahh..." Duo broke away suddenly from Heero's tormenting, as if he couldn't take it a moment longer, and climbed completely on top of him. He scratched ferociously at his side where the tickling had been taking place, then descended into an equally ferocious kiss. When after some time he released Heero's lips, he panted out, "I've completely forgotten what I was going to say."

"Hmm," said Heero.

"But I _do_ remember _you_ saying something about 'a thousand times more,' so let's get started on that instead."

"Mmm," said Heero, and it was a sound of agreement this time, as Duo bent to kiss him again.

...

...

...

Quatre awoke to find that he was for some reason so much hotter than usual that he'd flung off the blanket in his sleep and was curled up under only a thin sheet. His back against Trowa's seemed to be burning, and the air inside the bed-curtains was sweltering. Though he was still a bit groggy, he scrambled immediately out into the cooler air of the room. From there he half-stumbled, yawning, to the window, where the curtains were not yet open - apparently he'd moved too quickly for the palace to anticipate.

He had assumed that the clouds must have finally cleared and they were now in for a warm day - spring was moving toward summer, after all - but found somewhat to his surprise that it was still heavily overcast beyond the curtains and the glass. Whence that unusual heat had come, then, he could not guess.

If he tried hard to remember, he thought he could recall something from his dreams - an atmosphere, mostly - that might have explained it. But as usual he couldn't bring up anything, besides a vague picture of the starlit faces of the sleeping men in the courtyards, from the images that had been in his head while he slept. It was frustrating, but there was nothing to be done about it.

"More clouds up from the south," he said as he heard Trowa stirring. "Looks like another good day for reading."

Trowa made a noise of acquiescence, and appeared shortly from behind the bed-curtains, standing and stretching out his long body.

"Although after lunch..." Quatre was interrupted by another yawn in response to the sight of Trowa's stretching. "I think I want to find that room with the musical instruments again." He was moving past Trowa toward the parlor, from which the smell of breakfast was already making his stomach growl, and saw his friend's nod in passing. "You don't have to be so perfectly agreeable, you know," he added.

Trowa, who had, as usual, gotten in front of Quatre somehow and was now pulling out his chair, evidently thought he was referring to this behavior, for he said, "I told you I'm not going to waste this opportunity."

Quatre shook his head with a wry smile. "I don't know whether you have some sort of servant's behavior ingrained in your blood, or whether you just really like it a lot. But I meant that you don't have to agree with everything I suggest, and you don't have to do the same thing I do. There are plenty of entertainments available here; you don't have to choose the same one I choose every day."

"You think I'm going to wander off alone?" Trowa wondered a little dryly as he took his seat opposite Quatre. "And leave _you_ all alone?"

Quatre laughed. "Well, God knows I'd _prefer_ you not to... but don't let me bully you. You may pull out chairs for me, and you'd probably open doors for me if they didn't always open on their own, but we're not really master and servant anymore. We haven't been for years, and here especially we're not. So you're really not required to agree with me all the time."

"Since when have I ever done that?"

"You know what I mean. If you don't want to go to the library, say so."

"But I do."

Half exasperated, Quatre laughed again. Trowa was deliberately avoiding the point, but at least that meant it had been made. Whether it would accomplish anything was another matter entirely.

So, after breakfast, they wandered up to the library, where they'd spent at least the beginning of each of the last few days while it had been raining so much. They hadn't done their actual reading in there, despite how comfortably furnished it was for that purpose, because Quatre always had the feeling they were driving the Beast out by their presence. Today, however, he was determined to put a stop to that.

As usual, he thought he detected movement when they entered, and, approaching the sunken reading area at the south end, found the cushions there in disarray as if someone had only moments before been lying on and among them. It wasn't right that the Beast felt the need to vacate this comfortable room because they wanted to use it, and then they turned around and did exactly the same for him, when it was so spacious - and especially after last night, when the Beast had been so friendly as to invite them out to see his favorite outdoor spot and his gambols therein; there was no need for this kind of stiffness in the library.

To this end, "Beast," Quatre called softly.

"Yes?"

Although he'd been expecting it, Quatre was startled by the abrupt and utterly noiseless appearance of his host - behind him, no less. He caught his breath and turned, finding the Beast standing upright in the shadow of one of the staircases that spiraled down from the room's second level.

"I'm sorry if I startled you," the Beast said quietly before Quatre could speak.

"That's all right," Quatre said, waving one hand somewhat manically; his heart was still beating overly fast. "But I wanted to talk to you a little."

Taking a step out from behind the staircase toward Quatre, the Beast nodded.

"You spend a lot of time in here, don't you?"

The Beast seemed to hesitate, then nodded again. He was always so much quieter in the mornings, almost as if he wasn't fully awake. Quatre wondered if he had difficulty sleeping, down in that chilly, dirt-floored room in the wine cellar.

"But you always leave the moment we come in."

"I don't want to bother you."

"That's what I wanted to say, though." Quatre took a step of his own closer to the Beast. "We don't want to keep driving you out of your own library; there's no reason you should have to leave just because we come in. This is your palace, after all."

"In a manner of speaking," said the Beast very quietly.

"What do you-" Quatre actually bit his lip to silence himself. Something about the Beast's demeanor suggested that the conversation would not go on much longer if he finished this question. So instead, he took a deep breath and forced his words to change shape. "My point is, you won't bother us. Please don't feel that you need to get out of our way." When the Beast just gave him a long, silent look, as if weighing his request carefully behind those undersized, shining eyes of his, Quatre repeated, "Please," in a tone he hoped would convey his serious intentions.

The Beast's gaze shifted to where Trowa stood near Quatre, as if to ask whether he was in on this; and Trowa answered the unspoken question aloud with a quiet, "He's right. There's plenty of room for all three of us in here."

"Fine," the Beast said at last. It was a brief, gruff statement, but it didn't sound upset, and Quatre was immediately congratulating himself internally. Then the Beast moved past them both - a little stiffly, Quatre thought - and down into the sunken reading area, where he settled onto his side on a pile of cushions and pulled a book from beneath one.

It was fascinating to watch him lie down, since he didn't seem to be made for it; Quatre wondered at first if it was an effort for him to keep his head up, then had his question answered when the Beast rearranged the cushions slightly so he could rest it on one of them. Positioned thus, he had to turn the book sideways in order to read it, and, owing to the location of his eyes on his head, had to hold it up at an interesting angle as well; he did these things so readily, however, that Quatre assumed he'd had quite some time to get used to them and probably didn't think about it anymore. He didn't seem to be paying Quatre and Trowa any more attention.

Quatre turned to find Trowa also watching the Beast with a pensive expression; then they glanced at each other, and Quatre had to smile a little. He guessed Trowa had been having about the same thoughts he had. Next he set out to search for the particular book he wanted, while Trowa began wandering idly along the lower level pulling out titles at random.

At random was how Quatre had discovered the book he'd just finished reading, since he couldn't make heads or tails of the organizational system - if there was one - used on the shelves of this library. This wouldn't have been a problem if he'd been looking for another random selection, but at the moment he happened to want the second volume of what he'd just read. He couldn't begin to remember what shelf he'd pulled it off of, though, and not by title nor author nor category nor even the color of the cover did any of this seem to be arranged. It also didn't help that, after he had finished with the first volume yesterday, he'd set the book down and never seen it again; the palace must have taken it upon itself to re-shelve it for him without giving him the benefit of seeing _where_.

So he moved slowly along, his eyes running over one shelf at a time, searching without a great deal of hope for a familiar spine and (presumably) its similar-looking subsequent volumes. He wasn't going to waste a huge amount of time at this; if he didn't find it within half an hour or so, he would choose something else to read and try again for what he really wanted another day.

Rain was pattering against the tall, narrow windows he passed in his search, and this somehow gave the room, large as it was, a cozy feeling. It was the sort of day made for spending in a library, and Quatre wondered if the Beast was ever torn between curling up in here and going outside to jump around in the rain he liked so much. Probably not; he seemed to regulate his activities to the time of day when he had the most appropriate level of energy for them, and he never appeared to be in a mood to jump around anywhere in the morning.

Presently Quatre almost ran into Trowa, who had made the circuit of the lower level at about the same speed but in the opposite direction. Quatre grinned at him and requested, "If you see a black book with shiny orange lettering on its cover, would you tell me?"

Trowa looked briefly thoughtful, then turned to glance over at where three comfortable divans sat facing each other in the center of the room. As Quatre followed Trowa's gaze, he clearly saw what he was supposed to: a book just such as he had described lying on the low table that sat in the center of these seats. Curious and pleased, he approached and picked it up.

"This is the first volume," he said in disappointment. "The one I just read. I wonder what it's doing here."

"You just read that?" The question came, unexpectedly, from the Beast.

The divans and their numerous little footstools stood near the sunken reading area, so Quatre had only to turn to see the Beast sitting up amidst his cushions. "Yes, and I was looking for the second volume." He gestured around a little helplessly. "But I can't figure out how this place is organized."

"You could have asked me." The statement might have been mildly accusatory - or at least reproving - in any tone a little more emotional than the Beast's rather blank one. As he spoke, he held up the book he'd been reading, and the light caught and gleamed along the orange text on its black cover.

"Oh!" Quatre had to smile. "_You_ had the book I was looking for? How funny!" Mostly funny because Quatre had been specifically examining how the Beast went about the process of reading, but hadn't taken in the details of the book he actually held.

"I read that one in your hand recently." The Beast's voice went a little quieter as he added, "Just before you came."

There was a moment of slight awkwardness at this before Quatre, seeking something to do to take his eyes off the Beast, turned them toward the book in his own hand, which he'd opened and begun flipping through. "Why was this one on this table?" he asked with his gaze thus averted. "Does it need to be there?"

"I was thinking of reading some selections again," replied the Beast. "I put it there to remind myself to look at it tonight."

Quatre nodded. "It's really quite good, isn't it? That's why I was so anxious for the second volume; I'm hoping for more poetry especially."

The Beast left the sunken area - there were two stairs up, but the Beast just stepped right out - and came to stand beside Quatre. As always, his bulk and the great shadow it cast were intimidating, but in contrast his voice sounded noticeably friendlier than it had just minutes before. "Yes, I like his work very much. This volume-" he held up the book in his hairy hand- "is heavier on essay, but I'm very fond of those too."

"My favorite was the one about royal heredity," Quatre said, almost eagerly. "In here, I mean. It was so sarcastic it made me laugh."

The Beast's great head tilted to one side as he regarded Quatre with a thoughtful eye. "If you liked that, there are a few other authors here you might enjoy." Then he seemed to draw back into himself somewhat, all of a sudden, as if he'd just realized that, given the situation, Quatre might not be too pleased to accept anything he offered. "I can find them for you," he added stiffly, "if you want."

"Thank you," said Quatre. "I'd love that."

Seeming to relax a little again, the Beast said quietly, "I haven't read every single book in here yet, but I've gone through enough of them to know where most things are." Once more he held up the one he was in the middle of. "There are two more volumes after this. I'll find you the third. When we're both done we can trade."

Quatre found himself smiling warmly up directly into the Beast's face, unexpectedly and possibly for the first time. "And then it'll be a race to see who can get at the fourth volume first."

Nodding, the Beast seemed pleased.

"Of course, I probably won't be able to find it," Quatre added ruefully.

"They're organized by _year_," the Beast snorted. His tone indicated just how intelligent he thought this system was, and Quatre wondered why he couldn't simply order the magic to _re_organize. But, then, he _had_ mentioned that this palace was only his 'in a manner of speaking.'

The Beast tossed his book down onto one of the cushions, then climbed the nearest spiral staircase to the second level by pulling himself up its side via the railings; it _did_ seem a little too narrow for him to walk comfortably, and the action was almost as interesting to watch as his antics last night in the children's courtyard. He also completely eschewed the use of ladders when seeking books on high shelves; he simply leaped right up and clung with claws and talons. From the floor of the lower level, his great dark shape moving over the lateral space so high up looked like a huge spider with half its legs missing.

Eventually he came back down, more slowly, one-armed as he held books in the other: the volume Quatre was specifically looking for and two works by the authors the Beast had mentioned he might like. As Quatre accepted them gratefully, he felt the brush of the Beast's surprisingly soft fur against his hands. It was impossible not to start back the touch, and in an attempt to compensate for this he looked up at the Beast again immediately and smiled. "Thanks!" he said.

The Beast gave him a nod, and turned back toward the sunken area and his own reading.

Trowa had by this time settled onto one of the divans in the center of the room with a stack of three or four books. If Quatre knew Trowa, this was probably because he hadn't been able to decide which seemed most interesting, and so had taken them all and was determined to read every single one of them today.

That was a distinctly positive aspect of spending forever in an enchanted palace... Quatre had always been so sorry to see the way Trowa looked at the collection of fewer than ten books the Winner family possessed these days - books whose extremely tattered state made their resale value low enough that they could be retained with good conscience (a couple of them, in fact, only existed in halves), and which Trowa must have read a thousand times each.

At the moment, though, Trowa wasn't reading; he had a book open in his hands, but his eyes were gazing attentively over the top of it at Quatre and the Beast. Quatre, coming to sit beside him on the divan, wondered quietly, "What is it?" But Trowa just shrugged a little, shook his head, and turned his eyes downward to his chosen material.

Quatre relinquished his own stack. On top was the first orange and black volume, and as he went to replace it where it had previously awaited the Beast's attention on the table, it fell open to a dog-eared page. None of them had been folded over when Quatre had read the book, so he looked with interest to see which selection the Beast had thought noteworthy enough to crease the corner so inexpertly with his unfortunate hands. It was a poem. Quatre had enjoyed all the poetry, but hadn't taken any particular note of this one; now he reread it with greater care.

_Though my conscience turn to stone as I endure the casual violence of the indifferent rain,  
And softer, softer sound its voice until a cooling silence be its one refrain;  
And though I stand alone throughout all time, my dullèd hearing never more to mark  
The chiming, chiming church-bells, nor my eyes the searing light or ebon dark,  
A single memory of you, the world transcending, would yet my stumbling spirit serve to guide.  
But better, better, then, to have you within this crumbling sphere still by my side  
To make of one man, who could else a monster prove, a thing exalted beyond his due,  
Or, if worst be worst, to keep him ever wisely close in chain and halter, bound to only you._

Pensively he looked over toward the Beast, but found him entirely invisible from this angle down in the sunken area. He wondered why this particular poem had struck him, and whether or not he dared ask. Given the precedent, he decided probably not. He would just have to hope that, sometime in the future, he would come to understand the Beast a little better. Understanding him would certainly be better than living in fear of him.

Making sure the dog-ear remained undisturbed, he closed the book and set it down, then reached for the third volume, in which he was soon engrossed.

In the past, Trowa had informed him that he was a terrible reading companion, since he didn't seem able to restrain himself from sharing aloud any lines or passages - sometimes entire pieces, if he was reading a compilation such as this one - that struck his fancy in any way. Back at the estate, Trowa had always made sure to snatch and peruse anything new that came their way before Quatre could, because otherwise Quatre would give everything away during the course of his reading and spoil the ending.

However, Trowa had made the accusation without rancor, always seemed to listen without displeasure to the parts Quatre chose to read out, and was sometimes even willing to discuss them - and therefore Quatre had never changed his ways. He had shared a good portion of the previous book with Trowa, and had already begun to do much the same with this third volume when he remembered abruptly that the Beast was in the room and would be quite justified in annoyance at the human that had invaded his space and then started reading aloud bits and pieces of a book he hadn't gotten to yet while he was trying to concentrate on something else.

Mid-sentence, Quatre cut himself off, causing Trowa to look up at him questioningly. Quatre threw a sheepish glance in the direction of the Beast, and Trowa nodded his understanding. Then they both went back to reading in silence, Quatre determined to control himself and not irritate their host.

However, he became once again so engrossed in the book that he completely forgot his resolution. Not ten minutes later he came eagerly out with, "Listen to this - _With distant roll of drum to pace their passage, unbroken ranks in grey are marching south. And, chilling every heart, one spreads the message: 'It's war, it's war,' he says without a mouth._" He stopped there, partly because that was the bulk of what had struck him and partly because he'd remembered suddenly that he wasn't supposed to be doing this.

Trowa was looking at him emotionlessly, ready to comment if he ceased or to go on listening if he continued. For an indecisive moment Quatre sat still and silent, until a growling voice from not far off commanded somewhat impatiently, "Don't stop. Read the rest."

Quatre's breath suddenly came more easily. He was a little surprised, but at the same time distinctly pleased. He also found his tone rather embarrassed as he explained, "It reminded me of the weather the last few days." Then he cleared his throat, pushing away the embarrassment, and read out the entire poem.

When he'd finished, there were a few seconds of silence, and then the Beast made a low growling noise that caused both humans to flinch and stiffen. But it became evident soon after that it had been a noise of appreciation when the Beast said, "He did enjoy his rain."

Relieved, relaxing, letting out the breath he'd drawn in perhaps a little too rapidly, Quatre said, "Just like you."

"Yes," said the Beast, and for some reason all of a sudden his tone was recognizably sad. "Just like me."

After this they read on in silence - except for the occasional interruption Quatre simply couldn't help - for a few hours, after which the humans rose to go find lunch. Quatre could tell they were both wondering whether they should offer some goodbye to the Beast as they did so, or perhaps some thanks for his tolerance of them in his favorite room all morning; but in the end they just left a little awkwardly without a word.

He was still thinking fixedly about his host as they descended the stairs out of the library. Their eventual destination was one of the smaller dining rooms on the second floor, since the rain made it impossible for them to use the balcony room beside the greenhouse. And as they walked Quatre murmured pensively, "_One man, who could else a monster prove..._" When Trowa gave him an inquiring look, Quatre explained about the dog-eared poem in the book both he and the Beast had recently read, quoted the piece as best he could remember, and wondered aloud what about it had struck the Beast and made him want to reread it.

He was glad to share this mystery with Trowa, though he doubted his friend would have any more substantial insight into the matter than he did. He feared that some of the things they were encountering in this place, and probably a good many they would encounter in days to come, lay unreachably beyond the comprehension of humans, of mortals. He wondered whether, even years and years from now when they were accustomed to every little magical detail around them, they would ever know the truth.


	6. Chapter 6

Jealousy, Trowa knew quite well, was an inherently unreasonable emotion. It overlooked all logic and leaped straight to anger and pain, and it could only barely be balanced out by a disproportionate weight of rationality. Knowing this, however, fell under that last heading - rationality - and didn't seem to make nearly as much of a difference as it should on the emotional scales.

Unreasonable as he still thought it was to demand a human life, in whatever form, in exchange for one cut rose, Trowa could not rouse himself to any strong disliking of their host for his own sake. Despite the Beast's unwillingness to answer a number of questions, despite the occasional stiffness or flash of temper, he was generally polite and solicitous, often quite friendly, and sometimes downright entertaining. The problem was that Trowa knew Quatre felt the same way about him - in addition to pitying him deeply - and Trowa wasn't entirely sure what the Beast's return attitude toward his master might be.

It didn't help to remind himself that the Beast had at first demanded the price of Trowa, not Quatre; for he hadn't offered Trowa the choice of staying, just of dying - spending a lifetime here had only seemed to become an option once the Beast had looked into Quatre's face. It didn't help to cast back over the last few weeks and note that the Beast hadn't evinced any particular pointedness or partiality in his treatment of Quatre; for Trowa never had either, and he'd been interested in Quatre much longer. It didn't help to be aware that men taking such interest in other men was, to the best of his knowledge (which encompassed the dockyards and fishing community of Silbreaker), rare and probably unnatural; for the Beast was nothing if not rare and unnatural.

Did the Beast even qualify as a man? He had a man's voice, a man's build (as far as Trowa could judge by the shape of his torso, the most human-like section of his body), but he didn't seem equipped with parts that could lend technical veracity to the appellation. It didn't matter, though; the Beast obviously had a mind equal to that of a human's, which surely justified him in desiring companionship exactly as a human would, despite his strange construction... Trowa couldn't help thinking that, in extracting a lifetime's habitation from someone that picked a rose off one of his hedges, the Beast was underhandedly seeking a mate.

So Trowa was jealous, despite feeling it beneath him, utterly irrational, and quite possibly dangerous. His observation of Quatre's interaction with the Beast was becoming increasingly intense, though he never saw anything that would have given him the least moment's pause if he hadn't been in the grip of this unfair emotion. Quatre treated the Beast almost as he would a madman - as if he wanted to be friends, but still feared the repercussions of any conversation gone wrong. And the Beast was to them both the same solicitous but mercurial host he had been since the beginning.

Of course, the inhibitions that had always restrained Trowa would not apply to the Beast, should the latter decide that circumstances were in his favor. That a different and probably much greater set of inhibitions might apply was not a considerable source of comfort. Nor was the fact that Trowa was now in a position to spend a much larger amount of time on a daily basis with his master than he ever had previously, even at the estate in the old days.

The weather had become significantly dryer of late, and they'd taken to passing many of their daylight hours in the grounds rather than inside. During some of this time they wandered aimlessly, looking again at the various courtyards and wondering about the sleeping men, but most of it was spent reading.

Despite the prolificacy of other amusements available to them, they both kept gravitating back to books; and no wonder, Trowa thought - they'd both enjoyed reading a great deal at the estate in Silbreaker, and even Trowa, despite his position as a servant, had taken it for granted that this pastime would always be available. They hadn't realized how starved they'd been for it since the move to Beaulea until having the opportunity restored to them. Eventually, he was certain, their fervor for the library would cool as they settled into a routine that contained reading only in decent proportion to other activities, but at the moment they might be said to be obsessed. And when the weather was pleasant, it was easy to spend halves of days or even the entirety of the sunlit hours outside with stacks of books at their sides.

They preferred the southeastern garden with its overflowing basins of flowers, or even the shady little alcove of trees inside the circle of the gravel road, over the fountain courtyard with its animal statues that seemed to stare unnervingly at them; and often they would eat their lunch in the courtyard of tables, and never re-enter the palace until the shadows around them began to grow with coming dusk. And, given this new habit, perhaps the Beast assumed, one morning, that his guests would not be visiting the library, since they'd taken out a number of books the previous day and probably wouldn't need more for a while; he still saw them every evening, of course, at supper, but evidently he didn't want to wait, for he appeared at the door of their parlor while they were eating breakfast.

They were both more than a little startled by the knock, as the Beast had never visited them in their rooms before - and, indeed, had rarely sought them out, rather than waiting for them to call him, if there was something to be said - and, besides, the odd, somewhat muffled yet still rather intense sound of his hairy hand or paw pounding was enough to make anyone jump. After they'd done so, they looked at each other in surprise and some sheepishness for a moment before Quatre turned toward the door. His "Come in" was spoken with impressive levelness, but there was a questioning tone to it that expressed the surprise and curiosity and concern the humans felt at this event.

The Beast seemed preoccupied in the way only an engrossed reader can; the open book in his hand, his pensive manner, and body language that would probably have translated to a thoughtful frown on a human seemed somewhat at odds with his shape and size, though Trowa was coming to expect that sort of contrast. The Beast moved immediately to the table, looming over those seated at it apparently without even realizing the extent to which he did so, and said to Quatre, "I'm sorry to interrupt." His growling tone was almost brusque, and Trowa had the sudden image of him up for hours waiting with some impatience for the humans to arise so he could come see them; no matter what Trowa had lately been speculating about him, it was a pathetic idea. "I can't figure out what this line means," the Beast went on. "I wondered if you might know."

"Let's see if I do," Quatre agreed. He still sounded a little surprised at the Beast's presence, but nonetheless amenable to the request.

"_I might then have replenished my supplies in Sydeover_," the Beast read out, "_but, having visited that town a few months prior and fearing, as they say, a bycatch in my lave, avoided it and pressed onward toward North Riterdonne_. I know what a bycatch is, but I don't understand the full phrase. I looked in a few other books, but none of them helped." He sounded frustrated, and it interested Trowa to find him the type of reader that couldn't bring himself to continue a book when there was something in it, even something so small, that he didn't understand.

"I don't think I've ever heard it either." Now there was some apology to Quatre's tone, and perhaps it was in response to this that the Beast seemed to emerge enough from his literary reverie to recognize, finally, the other emotions there - the barely-concealed surprise and skepticism and touch of worry or intimidation - and perhaps how odd it must seem to his guests that he'd come here to ask something like this.

His tone was suddenly gruff and clipped as he said, "It's probably not important."

Before the Beast could turn and leave them, however, as seemed to be the tendency of his movements, Trowa finally broke silence with, "I think it is, though." After all, it wasn't as if there was anything _wrong_ with the Beast's visit or question - just unexpected and unusual. "At least, it tells you something important about the narrator."

The Beast and Quatre both looked at him, Quatre appearing not at all startled that Trowa knew the answer, but the Beast perhaps a little - or maybe he was just surprised that Trowa was speaking to him directly, which thus far hadn't often voluntarily happened. But he listened attentively as Trowa went on. "A lave is a net used by a single person, typically only by poorer fishermen. If a fisherman says he has a bycatch in his lave, he means he's gotten a woman pregnant."

"I see." The Beast sounded impressed. "Then you're right. It is important." He nodded his great head and gave the volume another pensive look. "It does change my impression of the man," he murmured, almost to himself, and fell silent.

Silence with the Beast was still consistently awkward. He was just so _big_... and in this parlor, rather than the huge library or even the still comparatively large dining room in which they were more accustomed to encountering him, he seemed to fill even more space and to menace even more darkly.

It didn't help, either, that Trowa had become suspicious of him and his intentions. That didn't increase his _fear_ of the Beast, exactly, but neither did it improve his general attitude toward him or any silence between them. He couldn't forget that the Beast had addressed himself specifically to Quatre upon entering the room just now; and considering that _of course_ the Beast would do so, when Trowa had given very little indication over the past two weeks of ever wanting to speak to him, made almost no difference.

"Thank you," said the Beast at last, shaking himself a bit as if out of his thoughts. "I'll let you get back to your breakfast." And with another nod that, given the size of his head, seemed like it should cause the entire building to tilt, he turned and left the room.

Quatre was staring at the door; he consistently stared after the Beast when the latter left them - and especially if he left them abruptly - as if he couldn't begin to decide what to make of their host. Trowa agreed with him there; he just hoped that what Quatre eventually decided wouldn't be too painful.

"You know, I wasn't absolutely sure it was him, at first," Quatre said, "since he's never come here before. For a second I thought it might be one of those people we keep seeing around."

This thought hadn't occurred to Trowa. "That would be strange, though," he pointed out, "after the way they've avoided us."

Quatre agreed with him, and finally dragged his gaze back to his breakfast plate. His expression turned to a regretful smile. "I'm getting used to him, but he still takes my appetite away. He's just so... unnatural."

Trowa nodded.

"I wonder why he is the way he is..." Quatre sounded hopeless, which made sense considering how unlikely it seemed that they would ever find out. The usual pity was present in his tone as well, however. "I wonder if there's anything we can do to help him."

Trowa shook his head, and even he wasn't sure whether he was trying to indicate that he had no idea or that he didn't like the thought of trying.

"Well, I can't eat any more." Quatre laid his serviette on the table and rose. "I'm going to have a bath and get dressed." As he pushed his chair in, he added with a sigh, seemingly more to himself than to his companion, "I think I might as well start wearing some of the clothing in my wardrobe. Those old things from home can only hold up for so long, and they seem out of place here anyway."

Silently Trowa nodded, and in doing so was reminded of Quatre's words a week ago, _"You don't have to be so perfectly agreeable."_ But there was no way Trowa could express his disinclination for this decision, since the latter was entirely reasonable and really didn't have anything to do with him. If Quatre was going to accept the palace's choice of garment, of course Trowa was also - but the fact remained that he didn't _have_ to, and therefore had no room to complain.

So when he too went to dress, he looked once again into the big ebony wardrobe, and this time reached in almost blindly before he could change his mind. As he'd expected from his brief prior exploration and his growing knowledge of the palace, the trousers and shirt and tunic he pulled out seemed exceptionally well-made and comfortable; symbol of acquiescence or not, he supposed they could be worse. And as he'd noticed before, they were pleasantly plain and unassuming, and in colors he favored.

The small drawers that ran up the side of the wardrobe contained underclothes and other small items such as stockings and handkerchieves, and another long drawer across the bottom held several pairs of soft shoes and some folded-over boots, all evidently in his size. He was mostly done being unnerved by even somewhat surprising things the palace came up with (aside from the Beast himself, of course), but it was a little strange, for some reason, to think of this place knowing his shoe size. Having decided to go through with this, however, he didn't hesitate to choose from the options presented.

Cravats had only just begun to come into style during the last few months of relatively affluent life (relative to Beaulea, that is) in Silbreaker; Quatre had worn them, but Trowa, having taken on a great many more tasks than before in his new position as fully a third of the servants the family had retained, had very rarely helped him dress in those days. So, since cravats had _never_ been a servants' fashion - perhaps they were now, which was why the palace had offered him a selection of them, or perhaps the palace had ideas about Trowa above his station - Trowa had very little concept of how to tie the things. He'd chosen one in dark grey that he thought wouldn't look bad with his muted green tunic, but after a number of tries in front of the glass at getting it into a proper knot, he was about to give up and do without.

At the sound of a knock on the door from Quatre's room, he called for his master to enter without looking around. Usually Trowa was ready for the day before Quatre was, since Quatre liked to linger in his bath whereas Trowa took only as much time as was necessary to get clean - but today he'd had to wrestle with a disinclination toward his clothing and then a cravat.

Upon seeing what Trowa was busy with, Quatre immediately laughed at him. "Here, turn around," he commanded; "let me help you." Trowa obeyed, actually distinctly frowning in his annoyance at the article, but found his scowl melting away instantly as he caught sight of Quatre approaching him.

Quatre, with his soft, shining hair, trim, compact body, and absolutely perfect face, had always been beautiful. He'd been charming as a child, back when Trowa had admired without knowing precisely why, and he'd grown into a flawlessly handsome man. Every fashion that had ever had a foothold among the Silbreaker nobility had looked excellent on him, laughable as some of it had been on anyone else; and in Beaulea in rough linen and muddy boots with a sunburn and sad, weary eyes, he'd still been unfailingly stunning.

So it wasn't exactly _surprise_ that Trowa felt now at seeing him again in finery - indeed, seeing him in finery richer, he thought, than anything Quatre had ever worn even during the estate days - but it still took several moments before he could focus on anything but how amazing Quatre looked in his new clothing, and he was lucky Quatre himself had a specific task in mind that turned his eyes away from Trowa's.

Quatre had chosen a black tunic that was covered with pink and cream embroidery in intricate patterns; this set off his pale skin and the perfect rosiness of his cheeks - he wasn't sunburned now. A gold pin with a large head beaten into facets like a jewel's, pushed through his pink cravat, glittered like his hair, and the light caught similarly in the embroidery on his tunic and on the long, flared sleeves of his off-white shirt so that he seemed to sparkle all over. He was belted in black, and the lines of his body were elegantly displayed all the way down his neat sides to his cream-colored trousers and shoes. Some of this was a little difficult to see with Quatre standing there so close with his hands at Trowa's throat, but Trowa's hungry eyes managed to take it all in nevertheless.

Suddenly Quatre laughed again. "This is impossible. Turn back around." He took Trowa's shoulders as he said this and guided him into obeying. This left Trowa facing the full-length mirror once more, and with only a moment to brace himself as he realized what Quatre was doing before Quatre's arms snaked around him from behind and Quatre's chin tilted up to rest on Trowa's shoulder so he could see what he was doing in the glass. "I can't do it backwards," he explained. And, indeed, from this angle, he was soon able to tie Trowa's cravat and arrange it properly.

It was moments like this that conveyed to Trowa with miserable, heart-sinking conviction that there would never be anything between him and Quatre more than the love of master and servant. _Trowa_ had to fight to keep down a hot flush and a raging of his pulse, whereas Quatre seemed as calm and indifferent as ever. If Trowa thought Quatre in any way capable of concealing the reactions of his warm, open heart, he might have had some hope... but he knew the concealment, like the desire, was all on his side, and would invariably remain so.

"There," was Quatre's satisfied pronouncement when he was finished with his task and, disappointingly, withdrawing from his inadvertent embrace.

"Thank you," said Trowa gravely, pretending to examine his reflection.

"Let's go down to the southeast garden," Quatre suggested next, beginning to wander away toward the door to his room, in which they'd taken to leaving their books in the evenings. "I feel like sitting in the sun."

Trowa, watching him move, said quietly, "All right," and paused a moment, his eyes still lingering on Quatre in his black and cream and pink, before he followed.

So they spent the first half of the day, as they had so many previous, reading outside. Trowa was deeply and pleasurably involved in a historic account - highly embellished, he had no doubt - of the kings of a distant country he'd only heard of superficially in the past; and he thought Quatre had lately been indulging his love of poetry by finding all of it that he could in the oddly-organized library. His only concern was that Quatre _would_ become sunburned if he spent too long basking in the sun, and he insisted afterwhile that his master move into the shade of the rose-covered trees.

After this they had a fine lunch of cold cubed meat and fresh vegetables in a creamy sauce with butter biscuits and white wine, then went back to their books for a while. Trowa was becoming a little restless, however, and felt that Quatre was too. This stint of so many hours reading each day was drawing to an end, he thought; they must soon find other ways to fill some of their time. And, perhaps because he had the same idea in his own head, he was rather anticipating it when, an hour or two after lunch, Quatre yawned, set down his book, stretched, and suggested, "Let's go wander around inside for a while. I wouldn't mind looking at the gallery upstairs."

Again Trowa acquiesced with, "All right," at which Quatre shot him a somewhat suspicious look as if just realizing that he'd made the proposal without consulting Trowa's inclination and wanting to be sure Trowa wasn't subverting his own will. To reassure him, Trowa added, "I was thinking exactly that." Quatre's face was still skeptical as he rose and gathered up his books, but he said nothing.

They didn't speak again, in fact, until they'd reached the long hall near the top of the palace with its eclectic set of frames and the paintings they enclosed. There, glad to move very leisurely around the room after all the stairs they'd had to climb, they exchanged opinions on the pieces they saw. Neither of them was particularly artistic in this area, but, as the saying went, they knew what they liked, and there was plenty to discuss.

Eventually Quatre seated himself on one of the benches that ran down the center of the long gallery, leaning back on his hands and looking fixedly at the nearest painting. The latter showed a man baiting a bull with a flapping cloth, as was apparently a custom or sport in certain neighboring nations. Trowa thought he knew why Quatre found it of such particular interest as to want to study it at length: the head of the bull looked something like the head of the Beast, though there was little further resemblance, and this gave the painting a very uncomfortable feeling - especially knowing that the bulls were usually eventually killed in such contests.

"I think this is horrible," Quatre said decisively at last. From the changing expression on his face, Trowa had rather been expecting this. "Who would ever want a picture of someone torturing an animal?"

"It's very well done," Trowa offered.

"That makes it worse. The fact that it's painted well makes it seem to be validating its subject matter."

"I disagree. I think it highlights the horror."

Quatre's mouth quirked slightly, a smile pulling at it in spite of his disapprobation. "I think that's the first time you've disagreed with me in weeks."

"Possibly," Trowa agreed.

Quatre laughed faintly, and shifted the subject, proving that his reflections had been running the direction Trowa had thought they must. "Do you think any of these pictures are related at all to... have anything to do with the Beast or his situation?"

Trowa shook his head; he had no way even to guess at such a thing.

"I already find this picture horrible, but if I was built anything like that poor animal, I don't think I could even stand to look at it. Do you think he ever comes up here?"

Again Trowa shook his head.

"And why would he have something like this in his home anyway? Who chose these paintings? Who _painted_ these paintings?"

"Remember what he said about this being his palace 'in a manner of speaking,'" Trowa reminded Quatre. "He may not have had anything to do with it."

"Are they meant to say something specific," Quatre mused on, "or are they just a collection like you'd find in any rich person's house? They strike me as a little too random to be a reflection of any one person's taste... but at the same time, the randomness, to me, says that they probably aren't intended to send a message, either. So what grounds were they chosen on?"

With this in mind, Trowa was looking around again at the nearest few artistic decorations on the walls. Quatre was right; the selection was indeed quite random, with no apparent connecting theme or similarity of style or subject. The more he looked, in fact, the stranger it seemed; it hadn't struck him before when he'd been examining each piece individually, but taken as an aggregate they did form quite an odd collection. "It almost looks," he began slowly, "as if the intention was just 'to have a gallery,' and whoever put it together didn't give it any more thought than that."

"You're right!" Quatre had joined him in gazing around at the nearest paintings, and was now nodding with a thoughtful frown. "It's as if someone just took the first hundred paintings he could get his hands on, without caring at all what they were like, and hung them here in no particular order, just for the sake of having them here. And it fits with the rest of the palace, doesn't it? Remember you were wondering who was supposed to sleep in all the bedrooms and who was ever likely to dance in the ballroom? Nobody is _supposed_ to, necessarily; it's just important that there are as many bedrooms as befits such a fine palace, and that there _is_ a ballroom.

"And do you think any children have ever played in that courtyard with the little house and the swings? Or are ever likely to? And the kitchens and servants' quarters in a palace that's run by magic... and the books in the library, organized in a way that would never help anyone find anything - they're just there because a library is supposed to have books, not because anyone's ever likely to read them, even though somebody does. It's _all_ here just for the sake of having it here."

"Why?" Trowa wondered.

"I think..." Quatre paused, then lifted his shoulders in a slight shrug. "I don't know. It feels like somebody set this place up, and gave a lot of thought to the details, but didn't really know how real people live."

If that was the case, Trowa thought, then the Beast was probably even more a prisoner than they were, and his desire for company even more understandable. It also, Trowa thought dismally, made his potential desire for Quatre that much more natural: someone as real and alive and considerate as Quatre must be a beautiful contrast to a place so ill-thought-out, so fake and so dead.

Quatre stood abruptly. "I don't want to be here anymore," he declared, and for half an instant Trowa thought he was referring to the palace in its entirety. But then he added, "Let's go down to the music room," and his meaning became more clear.

Throwing one last glance at the bullfighter and fielding an unexpected and unpleasant shiver up his spine, Trowa agreed.

They'd visited the music room several times already, and Trowa guessed it would eventually become a daily occurrence. He was only casually skilled at flutes and the like, but Quatre had always been something of a prodigy on a number of different instruments - and, like reading, Trowa thought, hadn't realized how much he missed the opportunity until having it restored to him after a long drought.

Their discussion in the gallery of paintings had shed some light on the contents of this chamber as well. They'd wondered, the first time they'd looked around here in earnest, at a selection of music that seemed utterly and incomprehensibly mixed when it came to era, style, and level of difficulty, but now Trowa thought this made a bit more sense. Interestingly, the palace would provide them with essentially whatever they wanted - he noted that today there was a distinct increase in the amount of music written for the instruments they'd played the last time they'd been in here - but this seemed to be in specific response to their thoughts and desires; it was a sort of overlay to the thoughts and desires of whoever had set the place up, which hadn't been nearly so intuitive when it came to actual use of the room and the instruments.

The latter, at least, were always in perfect tune, with each other as well as within their own scales, so it was possible to pick up anything in the room and play it immediately without concern, and pair it with anything else if they so desired - though, as Quatre had remarked the last time they'd been in here, not having to tune their instruments rendered the act of playing them a little surreal, as it had always been such a crucial part of the process back in the real world. Still, it _was_ convenient, when Quatre was in the mood for the spinet and wanted Trowa to attempt to join in on the flute, not only to be able to put a hand out and have the first piece of music within reach just happen to be written for those two instruments, but to have those two instruments sound perfect together without any preparation on their part.

Quatre was always cheered by the act of playing music, and Trowa was always cheered by the sight of Quatre cheered; so, if only for this reason, Trowa was grateful for the presence of this room and its contents. Soon they were deeply engrossed in working through the piece they'd randomly selected, which had turned out to be rather difficult, and good-naturedly debating rhythm and expression; all the morose thoughts they'd brought with them from upstairs had dissipated.

"Do you remember leaving that door open?" Quatre suddenly said, looking past Trowa's shoulder with a thoughtful frown.

Trowa looked around and saw that one of the doors into the room was, indeed, standing ajar. "I don't even think that's the one we came in by."

Abruptly Quatre stood from the spinet's bench. "Beast?" he called, sounding just a little suspicious.

Immediately the Beast appeared, large in the doorway the two humans were already regarding. "Yes?"

"Have you been..." Quatre obviously didn't think it was safe to speak accusatorily, even in a friendly way, and kept his tone level, but he still sounded curious. "How long have you been outside that door?"

The Beast shifted slightly. "I was listening," he said, answering the spirit if not the letter of the question.

"Well, if you'll come in, you can hear it properly..." Quatre shot Trowa a look that seemed to ask whether he minded, at which Trowa shrugged slightly.

"I don't want to bother you," said the Beast.

"You won't," Quatre assured him.

At this the Beast entered the room, seeming somewhat reluctant still, his black talons clicking on the tiled floor. He looked around, and evidently decided that the best place for him was on one of the seats covered in burgundy velvet that lined the wider arc of the curved trapezoid of the chamber, a few steps above the larger area devoted to the instruments. He leaped up onto one of the chairs, as he always did at supper, wavered a little as the deep, soft cushion seemed to throw him off balance, then settled into a crouch and turned his eyes upon them without a word.

Quatre had claimed that the Beast wouldn't bother them, but this was only true up to a point. Trowa didn't _mind_ playing for him - though he couldn't help thinking with a little dismay that Quatre's talents in this area must make him all the more desirable in the Beast's eyes - but the very presence of their host, big and clawed and looming as always, was going to make him perform worse, he was certain of it. And he was _already_ less skilled than Quatre. But there was nothing for it but to try anyway.

Actually it didn't go as badly as he'd expected, since he was looking at the notes most of the time anyway, and the effort necessary for some of the tricky fingering and long, breathless phrases was distracting enough that he'd almost forgotten the Beast was there by the time they were done playing. He remembered immediately, though, in some startlement, at the first sound of the Beast's heavy, somewhat muffled clapping.

"Very good," said their host, a little gravely, as if to underline his sincerity with seriousness.

Trowa nodded, and Quatre said, "Thank you," as he stood again from the bench. "We only just found that song today, though, so we could be better at it."

"I couldn't tell," said the Beast, stepping down off his chair to his full upright height. "I'm not a harsh critic. I never get to listen to music."

That 'never' was so final and forlorn that Trowa's curiosity was instantly piqued; he was certain Quatre's was too. But of course they couldn't ask, because the Beast would be sure just to leave the room. Quatre, however, evidently determined to get _some_ information, chose a different question instead. "What are your favorite instruments?"

It seemed to have been a good decision, as the Beast answered without apparent discomfort. "I enjoy listening to anything." He turned to glance out one of the windows as he continued; the sun was setting, and the shadow of the mountain against which the palace nestled stretched out across the grounds in a moving blue mass that enveloped and erased the light, readying the landscape for the deepening of night. This seemed to engross the Beast so much that he couldn't complete his thought. "I'm not built to... play..."

Trowa watched the dusk shadows crawl, ever-darkening, like a spreading flood across the grounds below, and wondered what the Beast found so captivating about the sight. Another day spent as a monster? One more day under whatever curse lay over this place? Or perhaps there was some sort of countdown, and this meant one day _fewer_ to accomplish some goal?

Whatever the case, the Beast eventually shook his huge, shaggy head like a wet dog, and turned back to his guests. "Sorry... what was I saying?"

"You... aren't built to play instruments?" Quatre speculated cautiously.

"Oh!" The Beast bounded abruptly down the two steps into the lower area where Trowa and Quatre stood, startling them both with his sudden movement. On all fours he went to one of the great floor-to-ceiling curtains that hid all the standing instruments and the shelves on which the smaller ones rested, and pulled it back. "No, I can't play most things," he went on, "but I can manage this one; you've got to hear it!"

From among the hoard of instruments that stood in tight-packed rows behind the curtains, the Beast lifted one right up and over some of the others; its filigree framework had wheels, but he didn't seem to want to waste the time to extricate it in a more conventional fashion and roll it out. He set it down again, and Quatre and Trowa moved a little closer to look at it.

Like many of the items here, this instrument was completely unfamiliar to Trowa, and Quatre looked equally puzzled. It consisted of two shiny metal bowls of sorts, side by side, that had been beaten into numerous facets; it was like looking at a huge cut jewel from the inside. The Beast was attempting to free a couple of round-ended wooden mallets (ebony; no surprise there) from where they hung by silver chains from the framework in which the bowls were set, and not having a great deal of luck. He cursed under his breath, though this was barely distinguishable from inarticulate growling.

Trowa reached out and unfastened the chains for him, handing him the mallets. One of these days the Beast was probably going to kill him for doing things like that, but Trowa just couldn't stand to see someone struggling thus without offering his assistance. Maybe Quatre was right, and he really did have some sort of servant's behavior ingrained in his blood.

"Thanks," the Beast growled. He didn't exactly sound annoyed, but Trowa took a step back anyway. Perhaps in response to that motion, the Beast looked up at them both and said suddenly, as if he'd just thought of it, "By the way, you guys look great in those clothes."

Trowa thought both humans were equally startled at this unexpected and possibly a little wistful-sounding statement. Eventually Quatre said, "Thank you."

"All right, now listen to this. I love this thing." And, rather clumsily, his big hands in fists around the mallets as if he could manage no more delicate style of grip, the Beast began to play the unnamed instrument.

It had a sound rather like a xylophone, but mellower: an easy-going, cheerful tone that was pleasant to listen to despite the fact that the Beast was quite obviously unskilled in its production - mostly, Trowa thought, because of the way he was forced to hold the mallets and a certain rigidity of arm that would not allow for motions more conducive to the proper playing of this instrument. He coaxed some harmonies out of it, but no recognizable melody; nevertheless, the humans were interested and entertained, and gave him a little round of applause when he was finished.

The Beast made one of his ironic bows, then laid the mallets in the twin bowls with two melodic clinks. "I have no idea what this thing is called or where it comes from. Have you ever heard of it?"

The humans shook their heads. "But there might be a book about musical instruments in the library that could tell you," Quatre suggested.

"Yeah, that's a good idea; maybe I'll look sometime." Given the number of hours a day the Beast apparently spent in the library, that didn't really seem like much of a 'maybe.' "So are you guys going to keep playing?" And the eagerness in his tone as he asked this probably related back to his earlier statement that he never got to hear music.

"I'm hungry," answered Quatre. "What do you think, Trowa?"

Trowa almost felt bad about depriving the Beast of the entertainment he seemed so anxious for, but in a choice between Quatre's needs and the Beast's, there would always be a clear winner. He nodded.

The Beast might have been a little disappointed, but all he said, as he bounded startlingly around them toward one of the doors, was, "I'll meet you down there, then!"

Quatre's eyes followed him, as they always did when he left all of a sudden, then looked around the room. "We should play for him again another time," he murmured. "_I_ wouldn't mind spending more time in here."

And Trowa, unable even to be jealous when he'd just been thinking essentially the same thing, nodded again.

This time, as they made their way down the several floors between them and the dining rooms, it was Trowa that caught sight of her first. He actually got a fairly good look before she turned away from them and moved out of his line of sight: a tall, slender woman in a trailing gown - a courtly, sparkling white gown of old-fashioned but very elegant design - with long, somewhat jaggedly-cut brown hair that fell over her bare shoulders. She was standing at the top of a staircase they were approaching, and seemed to cast a very specific, very sad-looking glance at them before deliberately turning to descend.

Quatre spotted her a moment after Trowa did. "Wait!" he cried in frustration, moving swiftly forward as before to try to catch up with her - but, also as before, by the time they reached the head of the stairs, quickly as they'd moved, there was no trace of her below. His sigh was almost angry as he looked intently around, down the stairs, into corners and, illogically, up at the ceiling. He seemed ready to start entering rooms at random looking for the stranger, forgetting about supper and everything else in his irritated curiosity.

Trowa put a hand on his shoulder, resisting the urge to trace with his fingers the shining embroidery on Quatre's tunic. "Come on," he said. "The Beast is waiting for us."

...

...

...

"This is a nice spot," Duo murmured, looking around at the little open space. It was dotted with bushes and a few trees, but much clearer than the forest behind them, nestled up against a high rocky ridge that was the first real indicator of the dark bulk of the mountains on whose knees they already stood. He couldn't keep the slight dreaminess from his tone as he spoke, and he knew Heero would ask.

Heero did. "For what?"

Whenever they weren't busy with other things that required them to remain relatively stationary, they'd taken to wandering at night; they would set off up the mountain away from the church, holding hands, talking about everything and nothing as they moved aimlessly through the forest, and only turn when they guessed they'd spent about half the time Heero could afford to be up here. And Duo couldn't help indulging in a little daydream here and there...

He shrugged. "Just a nice spot."

Heero's arms slid around him. "You know I can always tell when you're lying," he said close to Duo's ear.

"You _wish_ you could, you mean," Duo grinned.

Heero chuckled softly. "But, really, Duo. You've been looking around lately as if you're specifically trying to find something out here. _What_ is this a nice spot for?"

"You really want to know?" Duo squirmed in Heero's embrace, turning to face him and drape his own arms over Heero's shoulders.

"Yes."

"Kiss first. A really good one."

"I can give you more than that, if you want."

"It's a deal. Kiss first, then I'll tell you, and then, if you still feel like it, we'll find a nice spot against a tree somewhere."

Heero paused in the movement that would have brought their lips together, eyebrows skeptically raised. "If I still feel like it?" he wondered. "Is it that much of a mood-killer?"

"You'll have to kiss me to find out."

"Fine," said Heero, and immediately made good on his part of the bargain. Very good, in fact; Heero could, if he wished, completely overwhelm Duo and make him forget the rest of the world with the intensity of his kisses. It was a remarkable talent. "So tell me," he said when he'd finally, leisurely withdrawn from Duo's mouth.

"Aah... what?"

"What is this a nice spot for?"

Duo shook himself a little, and pulled somewhat reluctantly from Heero's embrace to look around once again. As he did so, though, the same mental image he'd had when they'd first entered the clearing appeared before his eyes again, and he smiled. "A little house," he said. He pointed. "Right there, see? Right up against that rock. There'd be room for a pen for chickens or something... and maybe a workshop over there..."

"Why?" Heero wondered. His tone was at once curious and amused, and perhaps a little cautious.

Duo laid his head on Heero's shoulder. "I want to live with you," he said. "I want a house where you can do carpentry and I can do... I don't know what... and we can be together all day every day, and sleep in the same bed at night, and basically just live happily ever after."

After this, Heero was silent for so long that eventually Duo pulled entirely away from him in order to look him in the face. Heero stared back; it was difficult to tell in the dark, but it seemed that a deep blush had overtaken his otherwise emotionless features. "So essentially," he said slowly, at last, "you're asking me to marry you."

Duo was suddenly blushing too - a rare circumstance, but, he thought, justified here. "Wow," he said. "I guess I am. I didn't really think about it that way, but, yeah."

Heero sounded a bit hoarse as he replied, "I knew there was a reason I was saving all my money."

"You were saving it," Duo replied in some amusement, "because you're too smart to go out and blow it all at the inn like other guys do."

"_And_ because you won't let me buy you presents."

"Happily ever after would be a better present than anything you've seen anyone selling anywhere."

Pulling Duo to him again, Heero whispered, "I agree."

His heart burning, "So does that mean you accept?" Duo wondered, equally quiet.

"Yes," said Heero.

They kissed again, and then held each other, still and silent in the autumn moonlight, for several long moments.

After a while, Duo asked, "So... mood-killer?"

He could hear the smile in Heero's reply. "Not exactly... but I'd like to talk about this a little more."

Duo squeezed him, then drew back and took one of his hands. "We should probably start heading back anyway, actually," he said.

Heero nodded, and together they began walking southward again into the trees. "I can start working half-days. I'll come up here and build the rest of the day."

"So you like the spot?" Duo inquired eagerly.

"I think it looks good. I'll have to see it in daylight to be sure. Then we can check with the reeve to be sure it's all right to build there."

"If you built the house yourself, I'd love it even more." Duo already felt like he was walking on air, and Heero's serious acquiescence to what an hour ago had been nothing more than an idle imagining made him feel even more wonderful.

"I'll need Alan's help with some things," Heero admitted. "But I think I can manage it."

"And you think we can survive? You really think we can do this? I still don't really have any idea what _I_ can do..."

"I'm sure Alan won't mind if I set up business here on the other end. And as for you..." Heero gave Duo an assessing glance. "You can read and write... why not be a letter-writer?"

The great bubble of excitement that had been building inside Duo throughout this conversation, and threatening to deflate at the worrying thought that he had nothing to contribute to the proposed arrangement, now swelled even larger. He threw his arms around Heero and declared, "You're a genius!"

"_You're_ the one who can read and write," Heero pointed out, laughing a little as he stumbled under Duo's assault.

"I'll teach you," Duo promised, kissing Heero's cheek. "And then we'll be the happiest people in the world together in our little house."

"Don't hold your breath, though," Heero warned. "I don't know how long it'll take. We'll have to arrange things first."

"Just looking forward to it will be enough!"

"For you? My impatient Duo?"

"Your impatient Duo will wait forever for you."

"It shouldn't take _forever_..."

"Even better!"

Duo felt Heero's hand seek his again, and they walked onward in ever-increasing joy, discussing their future happiness and everything that would contribute to it.


	7. Chapter 7

"I wonder what Merci would make of some of these breakfasts," Quatre remarked one morning over the meal in question, which today included a fairly complicated-looking fluffy cake-like potato-and-egg substance.

Trowa had to smile at bit. "She would regard this one as a personal challenge," he replied with certainty.

Quatre's third-youngest sister had had a hobbyist's interest in cooking since she'd been old enough to hold any kitchen utensil, and had taken upon herself the duties of family chef after the first move; she was almost the only one of them whose interests before the disaster had directly translated to a useful skill thereafter. As such, she had become the undisputed mistress of the kitchen, and had always taken somewhat possessive charge of all the contents thereof (when there were any). Her dictatorial matter-of-factness in this, combined with her diminutive appearance (she was only nine) made for an amusing overall impression, and even Trowa, who was not technically her brother, felt a pang at the memory of her solemn but childish bustling around the cramped little kitchen in the Beaulea house.

"You're right," Quatre agreed, with a smile half reminiscent and half miserable. "She'd be pulling it apart trying to determine every ingredient."

"Right at the table," Trowa nodded.

"And then she would try to duplicate it the next day. And I can only imagine what she would think of the kitchen here..."

Again Trowa nodded. That huge kitchen down in the palace's first cellar would be a paradise to little Merci.

Quatre's expression had turned thoughtful as he continued eating, and Trowa waited patiently to find out what was on his mind beyond the not-unusual reflections about his sister and undoubtedly the rest of the family. And when Quatre smiled pensively and made a little humming sound as if wondering, _Why not?_ Trowa became even more curious. Finally Quatre said, "Why don't we go down to the kitchen? Wouldn't it be fun to try to cook something?"

"'Try to' being the operative phrase," Trowa replied sardonically. His tone lightened, though, as he added, "But it doesn't sound like a bad way to spend some time."

"The last time we were in there," Quatre mused on, "I didn't notice any actual food; I think all our meals appear by magic. But I bet if we go down intending to cook something, we'll find a recipe and all the ingredients waiting for us."

Trowa agreed, though he couldn't help wondering how effective even a step-by-step guide would be; he'd never been much of a chef. Still, he was rather entertained by this unexpected intention of his master's. "What did you have in mind to make?" he wondered.

Quatre, who knew even less of cooking than Trowa did, replied vaguely, "Some kind of dessert? That we can eat later after supper, maybe? I don't know... maybe a cake or something. Are you laughing at me?"

"A little," Trowa admitted. Though in addition to his amusement, he also felt touched and sad at seeing Quatre planning an activity he undoubtedly thought would give him some dim sense of connection to a family he missed so very much. It had only been just over a month since their arrival at the palace, but already they both talked as if the Winner girls and Quatre's father were memories from a much more distant past.

In response to Trowa's acknowledgment that he was teasing, Quatre grinned. "It won't matter if we make a huge mess and don't come up with anything edible; the point is just to try it."

"I'm sure you're right," Trowa agreed placidly. Quatre, who, having finished his breakfast, was rising from his chair, paused and eyed his servant suspiciously, and in response to this Trowa added, "It sounds like fun."

"All right," Quatre allowed, and left the room to go bathe and dress.

Trowa appreciated that Quatre was so concerned with his autonomy and enjoyment here. The Winner family had always been good to their servants, but Quatre in particular was extremely thoughtful. Trowa had decided against explaining that, since he'd spent most of his life with little leisure to choose his own pastimes - and, indeed, specifically at Quatre's beck and call - this was nothing more or less than precisely what he was accustomed to. Beyond that, though there were a number of things he enjoyed doing, they were all vastly overshadowed by his favorite activity of all: being with Quatre. As if he would ever complain of any pastime he was allowed to share with his master, or seek out some other that would separate them!

Quatre seemed fairly cheerful when, an hour or so later, they headed down to the spacious kitchen, and even moreso when they found, just as he'd predicted, a neat array of ingredients waiting for them beside a detailed recipe. The latter looked as if it had come off a printing press like the page of a book, and they spent some time admiring the crisp evenness of the letters before bothering to read what it actually said.

That Quatre had finally started doing so was evinced by his laugh, simultaneously tickled and somewhat helpless-sounding. "This may end up being hilarious," he said. "_Loosen the chocolate mixture with one third of the egg whites, then fold in the remaining two thirds._ What does that mean? What is 'chocolate?'"

Trowa turned to examine the materials they were to use. His eyes ran over the relatively familiar sight of eggs, sugars, butter, and cream to several unknown substances in bowls: a fine dark powder, a pale tan substance with the texture of dirt, a mass of curling shreds that might have looked like grated cheese were it not so brown, an orange jam, and what appeared on closer inspection to be ground nuts. "I don't know what half these things are," he remarked in belated response to Quatre's rhetorical question.

"Then I guess that's the first thing to do," said Quatre cheerfully, setting the recipe down and joining Trowa in looking at the ingredients.

By tasting tiny bits of the unknown substances and referring to the paper for contextual clues about consistency, they managed at least tentatively to assign names. The ginger preserve and ground ginger, at least, were conceptually familiar, but what precisely the chocolate and cocoa were and whence they came remained a solid unknown. Still, having identified the various components, they felt they were ready to attempt combining them.

"_Line the bottom of the baking pan with a circle of baker's parchment_," Quatre read out, and began scanning the assembled items for the two in question. His hand found instead the bottle of wine that stood among the ingredients, and, after glancing at the recipe to see that it only called for 'a splash' on two different occasions, filled one of a pair of glasses that had been standing nearby apparently for this purpose.

Trowa held up what he assumed was the first thing Quatre needed. Examining it before handing it over, however, he felt compelled to remark, "This is an extremely complicated baking pan."

Quatre took it from him and turned it around, mimicking Trowa's interested exploration of the spring-loaded clasp that seemed to keep the parts together. He looked a little skeptical, but chuckled as he said, "It's hard to tell whether any of this is normal, when we've done so little cooking, or if it's all magical."

"And I don't know whether the magic is being helpful or patronizing with this..." Trowa offered next the baker's parchment, already cut into a circle that would obviously fit quite neatly into the odd pan.

Laughing as he took the paper and ceremoniously placed it inside the pan on the counter, Quatre was obviously about to turn back to the recipe for the next instructions when he was distracted by the wine, of which he'd just taken his first sip. "This is _good_."

Trowa's interest was immediately aroused by the surprised enthusiasm in Quatre's voice - not to mention the fact that Quatre, never much of a drinker, then emptied his glass and poured a second. When he'd set the bottle down, Trowa took it and, after examining its unlabeled surface, poured himself a helping as well.

It _was_ good. Trowa didn't know what it had been distilled from, but it had a tang to it and a very pleasant aftertaste. Though Trowa was far from a connoisseur, he thought this was the best wine he'd ever had, and he didn't scruple to refill his glass.

"All right," Quatre said, dismissing that distraction even as he continued drinking it. "_Coat the interior pan and parchment with butter, then dust it lightly with cocoa._ Oh, and it looks like we're going to need simmering water in a moment here."

With a nod, Trowa looked around for wherewithal to comply with that request, and found a very even fire already lit inside the stove, and, next to the water pump, a saucepan with a sort of smaller second saucepan fitted into it. Not really certain what the insert was for, Trowa removed it before filling the pan with water and setting it on the stove. Then he returned to Quatre's side, just in time to get a face full of the powdery cocoa as Quatre, attempting to 'dust lightly' the newly-buttered baking pan, blew on a palmful of the stuff and inadvertently sent it in all directions.

"Oh, I'm sorry!" said Quatre at once, though he sounded far more surprised and amused than penitent. He raised a hand to draw one pointer finger down Trowa's cheek. "It makes your face look dirty."

Trowa retaliated by taking up a pinch of what cocoa remained in the bowl and flicking it at the lower half of Quatre's face. "You're right," he said. "It does."

Quatre licked his lips - at which Trowa tried to keep himself from either doing something he would later regret or turning away with telling abruptness to avoid the impulse - and commented, "It's bitter... I have no idea what this thing is going to taste like."

"If it tastes anything like it's supposed to, it'll be a wonder."

Grinning, Quatre took a drink of wine and examined the baking pan. "I guess this is dusted enough. Next we're supposed to _Mix the remaining butter with three quarters of the chocolate and a splash of wine. Place them over simmering water and stir the mixture occasionally until it is melted and smooth._ Oh, this chocolate stuff is bitter too."

"Assuming that actually is the chocolate," Trowa added.

Quatre grinned. "That _is_ what we're assuming, since we don't exactly have a choice."

Trowa moved to bring the insert pan he hadn't known what to do with over to where they were working, judging now that its purpose was probably to be set over simmering water; then they put in the ingredients as indicated. And as Quatre stirred the mixture with a big silver spoon and Trowa admired the design of the insert pan (which had a little chimney to allow for the escape of steam from the lower pan, and two wooden handles so one pan could be lifted off the other without discomfort), they drank their wine and continued discussing Quatre's sister Merci and their memories of her culinary exploits.

This expanded, before the stirring and melting and admiring were finished, to a discussion of other of Quatre's sisters and their habits - and this led to that most precious of circumstances, an expression of satisfaction from Quatre that Trowa was here with him. In this instance, of course, Quatre was really just pleased at having someone around that knew his family and could join him in conversation about them, but Trowa was happy with whatever he could get along those lines.

"Why do you suppose this sugar is brown?" Quatre wondered as he lifted the bowl and examined it.

"'Brown sugar,' I guess," Trowa replied. Realizing that this had been a consummately idiotic statement - really, why had he said it? though Quatre just laughed - he tried to cover it up by asking, "What's next?"

"Mixing it with the white sugar," Quatre replied, suiting action to words.

Then the following step was to figure out how to separate egg whites from their yolks. This proved rather difficult and inordinately hilarious - the wine they were drinking probably didn't help - and they had to snoop around for three more eggs to replace the ones they'd botched. Fortunately, they did not get into any kind of egg fight, though Trowa suspected they were both tempted. And in response to Quatre's comments about wasted materials (or at least _after_ Quatre's comments about wasted materials), the eggs whose yolks they'd broken into the whites disappeared - whether to reform uncracked on the shelf where Trowa and Quatre eventually found what they took to be new eggs, to be used as part of a meal at some point, or into nothingness, there was no way of guessing.

"What does 'whisk' mean in this context?" Quatre wondered as he reread the current paragraph of instructions. He laughed as he added speculatively, "Take it away quickly? Maybe run around the room with it?"

Trowa traded his wine glass for something else on the table and supplied, "I think this device here is called a 'whisk,' so if you stir with this you'll be 'whisking' it."

"You probably have to do it quickly, though..." Quatre put fingers to his chin in an exaggerated expression of contemplation, drained his glass, then laughed again. "_In another bowl, beat the egg whites with a pinch of salt until they just hold a stiff peak._ 'Just hold a stiff peak?' What is that supposed to mean?"

"That seems self-evident," Trowa replied.

"Well, then," Quatre huffed, "you do it!"

"I will!" declared Trowa. So Quatre set to work on the sugars and the egg yolks and the melted chocolate stuff, and Trowa on the egg whites and a pinch of salt that he somehow misjudged and made rather larger than the recipe probably intended. It would undoubtedly taste all right accompanied by more wine, though.

Then, too, beating egg whites and (a perhaps excessive amount of) salt into stiff peaks was more difficult than he'd anticipated, and nothing even remotely mountainous had appeared in the bowl by the time his arm had grown quite tired and Quatre was already finished with his task. Quatre laughed at him and took over, but he turned out to be every bit as bad at it. Eventually they decided that the cake or whatever it was would just have to do without stiff peaks this time, because they were both weary of stirring.

"All right," said Quatre when that decision had been reached, "what's next..." He went to pick up the recipe, nearly upended his wine glass that was standing atop it, drank the wine, moved the glass, retrieved the paper, then peered at it as if it had become significantly more difficult to focus his eyes on in the last few minutes. But he managed to read, "_Using a large metal spoon, fold the the almonds and ginger into the chocolate mixture_," without faltering. In evident amusement he wondered, "What other kind of spoon would we be using?"

Refilling both their glasses, Trowa speculated, "A wooden one?"

"Oh, I guess that's..." Quatre had picked up the remaining clean spoon and had his thoughts derailed by it. "Look how shiny it is..." And he started making faces at his upside-down reflection.

"We never did decide what it means to 'fold' something into something else," Trowa mused.

This drew Quatre's attention away from his pursuit with the spoon, which was a little disappointing since Trowa had found that more than a little entertaining. "I bet I know!" he said enthusiastically, and seized the bowl. "Hand me the almonds, and the... what else did it say?"

Wordlessly Trowa obeyed, and watched as Quatre demonstrated his theory on how one folded baking ingredients. "We'll just have to hope I'm right about this," he laughed halfway through, "since they're in there now!"

Over the top of his wine glass Trowa peered into the bowl. "I doubt we'd be able to tell the difference anyway."

Finished with his vigorous (presumed) folding movements, Quatre set down the bowl and for a moment looked around vaguely, as if he'd forgotten what he was doing. Another drink seemed to remind him of their pursuit, however, and he reached for the recipe again. "_Loosen the chocolate mixture with one third of the egg whites, then fold in the remaining thirds._ What does that mean?"

With an odd feeling of deja vu Trowa remarked, "Well, you figured out folding, I think..."

"But 'loosen?'"

Trowa stared at the chocolate mixture and the nearby egg white mixture. "I guess that makes sense..."

"Then _you_ do it!"

As Trowa obeyed, Quatre was evidently having trouble with the recipe again. "The printing's all blurred in this part," he grumbled (thought it was a laughing grumble). "I think I need to warm up the ginger preserve." And, somewhat clumsily, he took up all at once the bowl containing the aforementioned, his wine glass, and a spoon, and carried them over to the stove, where he started clattering around looking for an appropriate pan for the warming of jam.

They managed - somehow - to get the dough or whatever it was called into the baking pan (well, most of it) with the ginger preserve (mostly) in its proper place between two layers of chocolate stuff. And, miraculously, they inserted the entire thing into the oven without any serious burns or droppage. Trowa was still extremely curious and rather dubious about how it was going to taste, though.

Back at the counter on which the recipe sat, before they returned to the latter for the final instructions (these on some sort of icing that was to go on the cake-thing when it was done baking), Trowa looked around for the wine bottle again in what had by now become a nearly unconscious movement; and this got him thinking...

He had never been properly intoxicated and rarely even tipsy, and similarly had almost never seen his master in either state, so this realization had taken him rather by surprise. "Quatre," he couldn't help remarking when the thought struck him, "I think I'm drunk."

Quatre laughed. "You can't possibly be drunk. 'Cause then I would be too. Have some more wine."

This seemed like the optimal solution, so Trowa complied. Quatre's logic was impeccable too: how could either of them possibly be drunk after only half a bottle each? Less than that, even - much less: when Trowa took it to refill his glass, the bottle still felt nearly full. Actually it was heavy enough to have been _completely_ full, but he was probably just misjudging the weight.

Quatre laughed again. "I can't even read this part."

It probably wasn't safe to lean right against Quatre even with the excuse of looking over his shoulder at the recipe, and _thinking_ about leaning right against Quatre and trying to keep himself from doing it made it so that Trowa too was unable for a few moments to read the words on the paper. He was just beginning to make sense of them when Quatre whirled suddenly.

"Can you read it?" he asked, grinning in amusement at his own inability. If he was at all surprised at how close he found Trowa (though _not_ leaning right against him) he gave no indication of it. In fact, he was immediately distracted from his purpose because of that very closeness. Before Trowa could answer the question Quatre remarked, "You've been tying your own cravat." And in direct contrast to the tone of melancholy in which he'd said this, he laughed. "I miss tying it for you."

Trowa was extremely startled, almost shocked. Quatre missed tying his cravat for him? That was... that was _wonderful_.

"This one's so shiny," Quatre went on admiringly.

"Is it?" In an attempt to look down at the cravat he was wearing, Trowa found his face rather close to Quatre's. His master's bright eyes were fixed on the article in question, and he'd laid his arms on Trowa's chest so as to run his fingers over the allegedly shiny cloth. Whether it really was shiny or not Trowa didn't know, because his gaze had never made it that far down. He couldn't quite breathe, either. This was all right, wasn't it, because Quatre had started it? This wouldn't give Trowa away or make Quatre hate him, would it? Quatre was so beautiful...

"It's smooth, too," Quatre sighed. He gave his sparkling laugh again, and then leaned forward to nuzzle his face against Trowa's cravat. "Mmm."

Trowa's hands rose convulsively to grip Quatre's shoulders, and only the self-indoctrination of years of desire could prevent them from running down and all over Quatre's body. But Trowa could not stop a choking breath from catching hard in his throat. At that sound, Quatre abruptly looked up at him, and the moment seemed to freeze.

Trowa had admired Quatre's eyes for most of his life, but somehow right now they were like nothing he'd ever seen before. He'd wanted for years to feel Quatre's lips against his own, but never before had they looked so perfectly-shaped and expressive. He'd always loved the sound of Quatre's laugh, but just at the moment it was downright hypnotic, pulling him closer. His heart had been Quatre's for longer than he could precisely say, but usually it wasn't quite such a blaze of ecstacy and despair.

He was moving, he realized in something of a panic, without remembering having decided to do so. He _never_ would have decided - _why_ was he - he absolutely _could not_ - what was going on? - and Quatre was so beautiful... just standing there with his arms still warm against Trowa's chest, looking innocently up with those honest eyes, trusting, wonderful, perfect... and Trowa was going to kiss him just like that and break everything. He couldn't seem to stop; this was really going to happen.

He was going to hate himself afterward. _Quatre_ was going to hate him afterward. And yet, just for a few moments, before everything was irreparably shattered, maybe...

Both rescue and stabbing torment came in the form of Quatre's attention being seized by something off to the left. "Was that the Beast?" he wondered. He sounded interested and not at all as if he realized he'd just narrowly escaped being kissed on the mouth by his servant.

Trowa felt as if it took an eternity to recover from his shock, but it couldn't actually have been that long because, when he finally managed to look away from the charming profile in front of him in the direction Quatre had turned, the kitchen door was still in the process of swinging shut. So the Beast had been in here, had he? He had _seen_... he had _interrupted_...

"I'll find out," Trowa said, and his tone was perhaps a bit harsh. And, though it was agony to detach himself from Quatre, he did so and moved toward the door. Behind him, Quatre laughed.

The narrow hallway was empty, and Trowa felt confused at first, until he remembered that the Beast had a tendency to move more quickly than the humans could ever follow - and then for an even longer set of frustrated moments he felt thwarted, until he remembered that the Beast would come when called. So, somewhat defiantly, Trowa called.

"Yes?" the Beast's calm growl sounded from behind him.

Startled, Trowa turned to face his host, whose approach or appearance or whatever it was he hadn't heard. "Why did you leave so suddenly?" Trowa demanded, and was once again a little surprised at the harshness of his own tone.

"I didn't mean to intrude," apologized the Beast. "I thought I would just get out of your way."

"Well, you _did_ intrude."

The Beast peered at Trowa with what seemed a keenly thoughtful gaze, perhaps even a little confused, for several moments, his nose wrinkling slightly as if he was sniffing the air, and then he seemed to realize something. At last, "I'm sorry," was all he said.

'Sorry' was a good word. The Beast looked so mild, somehow, despite his monstrous shape, and so pathetic... but that didn't mean a damned thing, and he needed to know it. "It doesn't make any difference that he feels sorry for you," Trowa said intensely. "Or even that I do. It doesn't change anything."

"Should it change something?" wondered the Beast emotionlessly.

"You might think it does. But there's no way he-"

"Trowa," the Beast broke in, now in a very patient tone, "you're drunk. We can have this discussion - whatever if is - another time."

Though Trowa wasn't exactly sure what this discussion was either, still he insisted, "No, let's have it now. I'm not drunk."

But the Beast had already turned and disappeared around a corner, and when Trowa followed was nowhere to be seen. Nor did he reappear when Trowa tried to call him back, and when Quatre put his head out the kitchen door to ask laughingly whether he was doing the rest of the cooking by himself, Trowa stopped calling.

...

...

...

Pulling away from Heero, stretching out on his side, and leaning onto one elbow in the grass, "You are distracted," declared Duo.

Heero raised a brow. "What did you expect? I'm not complaining, but 'kisses as a reward for reciting the alphabet correctly' isn't the best teaching method."

"Hey, I would have killed for a system like that when I was learning to read!"

"Didn't you learn to read as a kid? Wouldn't it have been your mother kissing you, in that case?"

Completely ignoring this far too logical argument, Duo said, "But I don't mean just from your alphabet. You've got something on your mind. And for it to be distracting you from _my_ kisses, it's got to be something pretty big."

Heero sighed faintly, and moved from the pose similar to Duo's, which he'd adopted in order to look at his lover, to lying flat on his back and gazing up at the stars. "I don't know that it's 'big,'" he said. "I just can't stop thinking about it."

"Wellll...?" Duo prodded.

"That pool out in the woods... not too far from Alan's house..."

"Yeah, what about it?"

"I've been bathing there as long as I've been in the area..."

Duo made an encouraging noise, very curious what could possibly have to do with a pool in the woods to engross Heero so.

"I think some people swim there during the day, but I've never seen anyone else out there at night," Heero went on. "The water's cold. I don't mind it, but..." He shrugged.

Still wondering what Heero's point was, Duo put in, "I'd a hundred times rather haul and heat my own bathwater than go for a cold swim at night."

This made Heero smile. "I'm sure you would." He squeezed the hand of Duo's that he'd reached to take, and went on. "Anyway, last night I was just stepping into the water when I heard..." His faint smile faded into a pensive, almost confused expression. "I heard singing," he finished at last. His tone indicated how odd he found the circumstance.

Abruptly Duo sat up, crossing his legs and looking down at Heero's moonlit face, extremely interested. "Did you really? What kind of singing? What did it sound like?" He didn't release Heero's hand, though, but now held it in both of his own.

Heero looked into Duo's face for a moment, then into the sky as if again studying the stars; but Duo thought he was actually thinking back to the night before, trying to find the right words to describe what he remembered. "It was a woman singing," he finally answered the second question. "It was beautiful... very beautiful... I don't think I've ever heard singing that beautiful before."

Duo nodded; this was what he'd been expecting.

"But something about it was also incredibly sad," Heero went on, causing Duo to nod again. "She wasn't singing words, just sounds... It was nonsense, but it sounded good - ah's and that sort of thing. I don't know how she even managed to sound so sad without any words, but she did. I felt like I would cry just listening to her."

"Did you see her?" Duo asked, though he was positive he knew what the answer would be.

"That was the strangest part. I called out and looked all around the pool, but I couldn't find anyone anywhere. That singing just went on and on."

With a final, decisive nod, Duo jumped to his feet, and tugged at Heero's hand to compel him to follow. Appearing a little confused, Heero did so, and Duo kissed him briefly before he began to walk and continued to pull him.

"You're not from around here," he began as they headed out of the clearing and into the trees in the direction of the church. "So you don't know all the local legends yet."

Heero, following, relaxed a little at these words; obviously he realized Duo was not only going to explain what he was now doing but also knew something about Heero's adventure of the night before.

"She's called the yara; everyone around here's heard of her. She always starts out this way: you hear the singing, but you can't find her anywhere."

"What is she?"

"Supposedly she's the spirit of a girl who drowned the night before her wedding. Usually she only appears to guys who are recently engaged." Considering the future they'd been discussing over the last couple of weeks, Duo couldn't help blushing a little as he said this.

He thought that Heero's, "Oh," held perhaps a touch of the same not-precisely-displeased embarrassment as well.

"She'll just sing to you for a while, if you keep going back, but eventually she'll appear in person. Supposedly she's incredibly beautiful."

"Hmm..."

Duo couldn't help laughing at the doubtful sound. "Hey, I'm just telling you the legend; _you're_ the one who heard the singing."

"It was beautiful," Heero admitted, "but I'm not sure I believe it was magical."

"I don't know if I believe in her either, but better safe than sorry, right?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, she's supposed to try to hypnotize you, once she actually appears so you can see her. Then if you go to her, she'll drown you. I guess she's taking out her own fate on other people in the same situation."

"Only men, though?"

By now they were beginning to catch glimpses of silver spots in the moonlight that marked the road ahead, and Duo reluctantly let go of Heero's hand. He also lowered his voice warily as he made the comment, "Maybe women who're like us, too, but I've never heard of it. You'd think the yara would have to be that way too to be willing to try it in the first place."

"How do people know that this supposedly happens?" Heero wondered skeptically. "If she drowns anyone she manages to hypnotize?"

"Stop ruining the legend with logic," said Duo in mock severity.

"Sorry," replied Heero in mock contrition.

"Besides," Duo shrugged, "if someone's been partway through the process but not drowned, it's probably not too hard to guess what the yara's trying to do... and then later if someone _does_ turn up drowned, people put two and two together."

Again Heero made a disbelieving noise.

They'd reached the back door of the little church, which Duo unlocked and opened. He moved quietly, since his mother typically went to bed at sundown and rose at dawn (he always tried his hardest not to scoff at the belief that temptation was easier to avoid during the light of day, since it led to this practice so convenient to his purposes); Heero, who was well aware of how things worked around here, followed Duo just as silently into the little kitchen he'd by now visited any number of times.

The place was a bit cluttered, but Duo knew where everything was, more or less, so it was only a moment before he found what he sought. Then he seated himself on one of the stools, shook his braid around his shoulder onto his chest, and took it in one hand. Heero, seeing what he was doing, started forward with a noise of protest, but he wasn't quick enough; Duo had cut firmly into his hair just above the tie with the shears he held, and gotten halfway through the braid before Heero reached him.

"What are you doing?" Heero demanded in quiet dismay.

The knowledge of how Heero felt about his hair was the reason Duo hadn't announced his intention beforehand. Now he finished cutting off the end of his braid, and held it out toward his lover. "Present for you," he said.

While Heero didn't hesitate to accept it, and though it was only the tied tapering end no more than a couple of inches long, he still looked dismayed that it had been cut at all. "Thank you," he said seriously, staring at the lock of hair that now lay in his strong hand. "But why?"

"Because," said Duo, just as seriously, "if there _is_ a beautiful hypnotic spirit trying to seduce you into drowning, I want to make it a little harder to forget about me and go to her."

Abruptly Heero knelt down beside the stool on which Duo sat, gazing up at him with unblinking blue eyes and taking his hand. "You think I could forget you that easily?" he demanded, very quietly but very intensely.

"If there's magic involved," Duo said sadly, "yeah, probably."

He thought Heero looked a little hurt.

What Duo would have _really_ liked to ask was that Heero stay away from that pool in the woods all together; but it was obvious that Heero wasn't enough convinced that this was a legitimate threat, rather than some kind of coincidence or prank, to change his habits. So what he asked instead was, "Will you keep it with you?"

"Always." Heero nodded, holding the lock of hair against his chest. "And don't worry... It would take more than a pretty song to seduce me away from you."

Duo smiled, though he wasn't entirely comforted. Because if the legend was true, 'more than a pretty song' was exactly what would come next.

...

...

...

...

The first hint Trowa had that he'd been unconscious was his return to consciousness. For some time, though, coherent thought was extremely difficult. There did seem to be a number of things to feel, so he just sat still and tried to work through them.

Quatre was asleep (or whatever the appropriate term might be) half lying on Trowa's chest where they were both slumped on a wide bench in a corner of the kitchen, and Trowa had one arm around him. This was at first the only thing Trowa was able to concentrate on (for a given value of 'concentration'), because Quatre was warm and placid, simultaneously soft and firm, and smelled very nice.

...or at least nicer than the stale taste in Trowa's mouth was rendering most other scents he could pick up in the room. He wasn't certain whether it was this unpleasant flavor or the slimy feeling to his teeth and tongue that had caused the nausea he was suddenly keenly aware of, or whether that was simply a natural result of his awakening. Either way, he didn't feel like moving at all yet, just in case.

The problem was that he needed a visit to a washroom, and this need was steadily and rapidly growing more insistent. If the nausea persisted, it would undoubtedly redouble. He didn't want to let go of Quatre - _ever_ - but after not too long it was going to become imperative. So he forced himself to open his aching eyes a bit wider and look properly around.

The room was dark, lit only by the softly-glowing oven and a few dim candles. The row of little windows near the ceiling that looked out over the paved ground of the kitchen-yard was completely black. Trowa honestly couldn't remember what time it had been when... anything... earlier... nor how long they'd spent trying to do whatever they'd been doing in here... but it still struck him as a little surprising that it was dark outside now.

Cautiously he shifted, trying simultaneously to test his powers of mobility and to ease Quatre off without disturbing him. By the feeling of his limbs as he moved and the way his vision was still somewhat blurry around the edges, he judged that he was not yet entirely sober - but at least he was sober enough now to acknowledge that he had been very drunk and probably still was.

Having managed to get Quatre into a more independent slump on the bench, he was preparing to rise and discover whether he could walk in anything like a straight line in response to the previously-mentioned imperative. In doing so, his foot knocked against the wine bottle they'd evidently taken to drinking directly from (given the lack of glasses in the vicinity) before passing out. Bending slowly to retrieve this, weary and curious, he found, not entirely to his surprise, that it _still_ felt heavy enough to be full. So much for never having finished the bottle; how much they'd actually drunk, thinking themselves safe in never having reached the bottom, must always remain a mystery.

Whether the palace realized that the moment he was properly upright his need for the washroom was abruptly exponentially greater, and kindly set one next door, or whether Trowa simply didn't remember the steps and the route he took to reach the chamber in question, he wasn't sure. But he did, thankfully, get there, and then was able to take his time (after a few initial hasty actions) doing what was necessary to feel a bit better.

Meanwhile, he was attempting to remember what they'd been doing earlier besides getting unusually drunk. When his memory-sifting came up with first an image of Quatre licking his lips, then the sound of Quatre's wonderful laugh, and finally a very striking picture of Quatre's sparkling eyes (in the midst of nothing else even remotely as clear), he gave a sigh that was half laugh and half expostulation; it seemed alcohol only exacerbated his single-mindedness. Still, contextual clues did seem to indicate that they'd been attempting to cook something, and that seemed to fit.

A little less nauseated, with a cleaner mouth, and conscious of a rather disturbing (under the circumstances) desire to drink more wine, he eventually found his way back to the kitchen. He was certain by now, clued by his inability to walk quite straight and a certain dizziness that _would_ persist, that he really wasn't sober yet, but that didn't really bother him.

Quatre was sitting up and gazing blearily around when Trowa entered the room, looking somewhat like a finely-dressed little boy with his pink cheeks and lips and sleepy eyes. When he saw Trowa, he smiled angelically as if Trowa was precisely what he'd been looking for and everything he needed. Trowa's breath caught.

Then, abruptly, Quatre's expression twisted and changed, and he staggered to his feet with a gulped, "...washroom..." And he stumbled past Trowa out the door.

Absently, drowsily, but not discontentedly, Trowa wandered around the kitchen, and somehow found the wine bottle in his hand without remembering having encountered it or picked it up. There was something very welcoming and familiar - he would have called it 'reassuring' if he'd been in need of reassurance - about the taste and feel of the wine in his throat, and what he'd intended as a brief sip just to remind himself of the flavor became a long pull. Then he set the bottle down on the counter beside the next object he wanted to investigate.

This was a covered dish on a sort of pedestal that looked a little out of place on the clean, bare countertop. There was hardly a gleam on the silver cover as Trowa lifted it, and the object beneath looked black in the dimness despite something in the foggy back of Trowa's head insisting that it was brown. It seemed to be covered in a thick icing that had been applied very smoothly and evenly, and Trowa frowned as he once again attempted to remember his earlier activities.

Hearing the kitchen door open off to his left, he asked, "Did _we_ make this?"

"I think you did, yeah."

The unexpected voice made Trowa turn. "Oh, hello," he said, rather stupidly, to the Beast.

"Hello!" the Beast echoed cheerfully as he came into the room, claws and talons clicking on the tiled floor. "You guys finally woke up! Where's Quatre?"

Trowa squelched the urge to snap at him for no good reason. He didn't want to be the kind of drunk that directed incoherent accusations at someone he had no actual proof was interested in the same person he was. So he just said briefly, "Washroom," and returned his scrutiny to the improbable cake.

The Beast joined him, leaning down to snuffle at it before commenting, "This smells good! Do I get some?"

Trowa looked back over at him in some surprise. In the dark room, the Beast was little more than a hulking shadow, with only the faintest golden brighter spots marking where the limited light of oven and candles caught his eyes and horns and nose. Before Trowa could ask the question the Beast's words had prompted, the kitchen door opened again and Quatre joined them.

His greeting to the Beast was as cheerful as the Beast's had been to Trowa, and for the latter he had another beautiful smile; Trowa judged by his eyes and his movements, however, that he too was still somewhat intoxicated.

"So what are we doing here?" Quatre asked as he came to stand beside them at the counter. "Getting more drunk?" And he laughed.

"We were about to eat this cake you guys made," the Beast said in a grinning sort of tone, "and _I_, at least, was going to try some of the wine that could tempt you sober gentlemen to get so drunk in the first place!"

Quatre's eyes went wide with surprise, and he asked at once, "Can you eat things like this? And drink wine?" Trowa had a moment of pure delight at hearing Quatre ask the same question _he_ had been about to; they'd had the same thought!

"Well, I _shouldn't_," the Beast said. "It may upset my stomach... but I should be over it by morning. And if you guys made this thing, I just _have_ to try it!"

Quatre's gaze shifted to the cake, and he started to laugh.

Thinking he knew what had so amused his master, Trowa said, "You may be taking more of a risk than you're aware of. We've never made anything like this before, and we were-" Memories were trickling back, incomplete still, and Trowa interrupted himself in some vague horror to ask, "Quare, what were we _doing_ with those eggs earlier?"

Quatre just laughed harder.

The Beast echoed this sound in his dog-like fashion. "Find me a bowl!" he urged. "I have to taste this dangerous cake!"

Trowa was almost tempted to laugh himself at the Beast's enthusiasm. As he and Quatre looked around for dishes, somewhat clumsily he had to admit, and eventually found precisely what they needed for the three of them all together on a shelf, he had to worry a little, aloud, about whether eating cake was at all a good idea in his current state.

"My stomach still does feel a little weird," Quatre conceded in reply. "But I think putting some food in it will help."

"I don't know how foodlike anything we made is likely to be," Trowa worried further.

"We'll see!" said Quatre cheerfully.

"It's sure to taste fine if you drink some wine with it," the Beast said slyly.

Quatre, who had been examining the cake in preparation for cutting it up, rounded on their host. The spinning motion was a bit much for him, and he staggered, laughing, before he caught the counter and regained his balance. "Are you trying to get us drunker?" he finally demanded of the Beast.

"No." The Beast was _clearly_ lying, and, moreover, failing to keep the mischievous tone from his growling voice. "Of course not!"

"Well, if we keep drinking..." Quatre took up the wine bottle in an almost caressing movement that made Trowa nothing short of ragingly jealous. "You have to too!"

"I already said I was going to!" the Beast protested Quatre's accusatory tone.

Quatre laughed and, taking apart the two nested bowls they'd found on the shelf, began pouring wine into one of them, mostly without spilling. He set it on the floor before the Beast, then returned his attention to the cake.

"This actually looks really good," he said, craning his neck to examine the thing from all angles. "I don't think I can cut it up; it's too pretty!"

Fortunately, Trowa was the one holding the long and relatively blunt knife they'd picked up along with the other dishes on the shelf, and he had no qualms cutting into the admittedly pretty cake. This is not to say he did it particularly dexterously, and the slices he somehow managed to get off the platter onto their plates and into the Beast's other bowl were so mismatched that Quatre was laughing again as Trowa distributed them.

"All right, everyone on the count of three-" Quatre began, but it was too late: the Beast had already started.

For a moment the two humans just stood watching him; it was, after all, the first time they'd seen him eat. Trowa could understand why he avoided doing so in front of them. It wasn't so much that he made an enormous mess - though he did - as that the motions involved were so very... well... bestial. This would certainly look out of place in a fine dining room. Here, however, the sight just made Quatre laugh.

"Fine!" the latter said at last. "Come on, Trowa." And he dug his fork into the contents of his plate.

Having obeyed, "This... is good..." said Trowa in astonishment.

"It _is!_" Quatre's eyes had gone wide. "This chocolate flavor is amazing!"

"Are you sure _we_ made this?" Trowa found himself pouring wine into their glasses almost without even really thinking about what he was doing.

"No," Quatre replied, accepting his wine glass. "Or at least, the palace probably fixed it up after we were done with whatever we were actually doing in here." He laughed again. "Beast? How is it?"

The Beast had turned from one bowl to the other and was lapping up wine with a large pink tongue and a noise like an enthusiastic dog attacking a pond. He finally pulled away and looked up at them; there was cake all over his muzzle, at which Quatre made an obvious, futile attempt not to laugh again. "The cake seems pretty good," he said. "The wine is _awful_. How the Hell did you guys drink so much of it?"

"I think it's very good," was Quatre's straightforward answer, and he took a long drink to prove it. "Although after this I think I'm never getting drunk again."

"Why is that?" the Beast wondered.

"Aside from not being able to remember most of what we did earlier..." Trowa suggested at a murmur.

"Oh, that's definitely part of it!" Completely belying the slight grimace that had taken hold of his face, Quatre laughed yet again. "Maybe we can drink enough right now to make us forget _any_ of this ever happened!" Then he touched first his stomach and then his forehead. "I can already tell this is not going to be nearly as much fun once I've sobered up, though. I'm going to be miserable in the morning, I'm afraid!"

The Beast laughed too. "I wish I could be there when you guys wake up."

"But for now!" Quatre whirled back toward his plate, reeling and steadying himself on the counter as before. "We've still got most of a cake to take care of, and it's better with wine!" And he reached once more for the bottle.


	8. Chapter 8

"What's a 'telescope?'"

They'd decided to spend a few hours in the library this morning, and Quatre had come across this unfamiliar word in his chosen volume. Trowa tended to know everything, which (along with his patience and interest in just about any subject) made him an excellent reading companion, and Quatre had no problem asking any random question aloud that occurred to him.

It was, however, not Trowa but the Beast that answered, from where he lay, as usual, among the cushions in the sunken reading area. "A sort of spyglass. Like sailors use, but more powerful."

"Oh," said Quatre in understanding. "For studying the stars."

"Or anything far off," the Beast clarified. "It works day or night. There's one here, on the tower."

Quatre lowered his book. "Is there? I've never seen it when I was up there."

"Do you want me to show you?"

"Sure; that sounds interesting." Quatre noticed, as he closed his book and set it aside, that Trowa did the same. He'd given up insisting that Trowa was welcome to do whatever he wanted and wasn't required to follow Quatre around - not that Quatre in any way _minded_ Trowa following him around; it just didn't seem fair to Trowa - but at the moment Trowa's lips were a little tighter than usual, his brows a touch more constricted; so Quatre said, "Trowa, you don't have to come if you're not interested."

"I am interested," Trowa replied immediately, rather as Quatre had expected. What was causing those subtle signs of discontent, then, he couldn't guess. Trowa was just too good at hiding his thoughts and feelings, which was sometimes frustrating.

It wasn't far from the library to the tower, and soon they were stepping out onto the round balcony into a whippy late summer breeze and warm sunlight. Every time Quatre had come here it had been windy, perhaps simply because they were up so high. The wind was certainly stronger than it would have been below, but not unpleasantly so, and he raised a hand to adjust his hair so it wouldn't blow in his face.

The Beast gestured, and Quatre, looking in that direction, saw that there was indeed a device of some sort on three legs near the railing a few paces away. If he'd been up here more than two or three times and spent more than a couple of minutes, he must have seen it before.

Following the Beast, he began moving toward the object, but noticed as he did so that Trowa remained in the doorway, holding the door as if for stability or balance, still looking somewhat displeased. Questioningly Quatre said his name, now seriously wondering what was wrong. Hearing this, the Beast also turned back.

Trowa swallowed and then took a deep breath. "I'm sorry," he said. "I can't stand it up here. I'd like to see the telescope, but I think I'm going to have to go back inside."

"Oh!" said Quatre, surprised and sympathetic. "I'm sorry!" He should have noticed; he should have seen before that this was how Trowa felt. For Trowa hadn't ever come to the railing, had he? He'd always stood beside the door, just as he was doing now. "I should have realized! Yes, go back inside and find something fun to do that won't bother you; don't worry about us."

Trowa looked from Quatre to the Beast, who nodded. Mimicking this gesture minutely, Trowa turned wordlessly and disappeared through the door, which closed in equal silence behind him.

"I never knew," Quatre mused, moving to stand beside where the Beast was taking the telescope in his great hairy hands. "The balcony room on the third floor doesn't bother him, but I guess this is just too high. And I never realized..."

Stilling his motions for a moment, the Beast turned toward Quatre. It was a strange look that Quatre didn't quite understand; many of the Beast's looks were, given the nature of his face, but Quatre had been coming to recognize what he meant by some of them - and this one was far outside the range of familiar expressions. All the Beast said, however, was, "It's funny how long you can know someone and still never find out certain things about them."

Quatre nodded, and finally gave his attention to the telescope. "So how does this work?"

"First, point it generally where you want to look," the Beast instructed. "This is the eyepiece here. Use these knobs to adjust where you're looking on a large scale. This one is vertical. This one is horizontal. These two for smaller adjustment. This one adjusts the focus."

He was partially demonstrating the use of each piece of the long brass object as he spoke, and everything, from his bodily contortion to bring one of his inconveniently-placed eyes in line with the eyepiece to his slow, clumsy manipulation of the knobs, looked painstaking and difficult. Quatre had the urge to push his hands aside and make the adjustments himself, since he couldn't help feeling pity and embarrassment for the poor construction of body the Beast suffered that made this difficult for him... but, while Trowa never had any problem doing this, Quatre still couldn't quite bring himself to. It seemed like an insult coming from him, somehow. Not that it mattered much at the moment, though; the Beast gestured for Quatre to try the device himself, and the next several minutes were spent getting used to the workings.

Quatre remembered thinking, when he'd first stood on this tower, that if he had better eyesight he could probably see to the edge of the forest from here. Here, then, was artificially better eyesight, and he couldn't help feeling a flare of bittersweet excitement as he considered that he might now even be able to catch a glimpse of Beaulea or its environs. He still wasn't _entirely_ certain of the exact geographical position of the palace - if it even had one, and wasn't squeezed into some nonexistent space that only _appeared_ to be surrounded by forest - but that didn't stop him from pointing the telescope northward in what he thought must be the direction of his family's home.

As far up into the foothills as they appeared to be here, the palace rose significantly higher than the bulk of the surrounding forest, giving Quatre a good view in most directions. At first he could see nothing but trees, but that didn't make it any less exciting when shapes that stood he knew not how far away came into focus at his turning of one of the knobs. He couldn't help exclaiming over what he saw, mundane as it generally was, simply because it was so interesting to be able to see it from here when it must be so distant. He'd known of spyglasses before this, of course, but had never used one, so this was an entirely new experience to him.

He didn't spend long looking at any particular patch of forest, only kept moving his field of vision and refocusing, until suddenly he located a stretch of road bared to view because it ran along a little ridge or cliff so that the tops of the trees in front of it were just below. Here Quatre lingered for some time, hoping with a strange forlornness to see somebody pass by, as it struck him all of a sudden just how long it had been since he'd seen another human besides Trowa. But eventually, with some reluctance, he continued scanning northward, hoping to find the end of the trees.

The Beast seemed pleased by Quatre's interest and enthusiasm, readily answering his questions about the telescope and responding to his fascinated sounds and comments. The only time he had nothing to say was when Quatre inadvertently mentioned the road and his hope that he might see someone on it, but that was no surprise.

Eventually the Beast volunteered the information that he enjoyed using the telescope himself from time to time, and that if there was something specific Quatre was looking for he could probably point him in the right direction. He said it a little hesitantly, which wasn't unusual when he was offering one of his guests any kind of favor, but in addition to this there was in his words a touch of the sadness that seemed more related to his general situation than to Quatre.

And in the face of this, Quatre couldn't bring himself to ask the Beast if he knew of a town that lay somewhere beyond the northern border of the forest, reminding him at once of the home he'd taken Quatre from forever and a place he himself, most likely, could never visit. In searching for a less awkward answer, he responded instead with a question.

"Do you look at the stars? This must be wonderful at night."

"No. I never use it at night."

The Beast's unexpected shortness made Quatre glance up for the first time in quite a while. "Why not?"

Not looking at him, but gazing out over the railing on which his great hands rested, the Beast shrugged a little. His head was so large that, in the thick dark hair that flowed off of it, a movement so small almost disappeared, but Quatre had become fairly accustomed to picking it out. "I have less patience by the end of the day," the Beast said. "My hands aren't made to use something like this." And perhaps he was remembering his lost humanity, for the sorrow in his tone had only increased.

Slowly Quatre nodded, and returned to the telescope in a more somber frame of mind. As he'd come to spend more and more time with the Beast and have conversations with him besides just at supper, it often happened thus: something the Beast said or did would, in rerouting Quatre's thoughts to the mystery of the palace and its dubious master, irrevocably change the tenor of his current activity, if not the very activity, often for the more melancholy. Quatre couldn't really blame the Beast for this. He remembered Trowa speculating once that the Beast wanted to inflict his own suffering on others; but Quatre believed by now that the Beast's sorrow and loneliness were utterly beyond his control, that it couldn't be his fault if they wore off on those around him.

He'd brought his view to the edge of the forest at last, but found this so far distant that even the telescope's powerful eye could not do much for it. Still, he panned laterally and made what he could of the hazy shapes and colors. Some sort of noise expressing his minor frustration at his continued failure to find the town where his family lived must have escaped his lips, for the Beast asked him, "What are you looking for?"

Not inclined to lie, Quatre replied briefly, "Beaulea."

He thought there was unhappy shifting beside him, but the Beast just said courteously, "Is it a big town? I've never been north of the forest."

Finally abandoning the search as hopeless - though that didn't necessarily mean he wouldn't retry it later - Quatre turned thoughtfully to face the Beast again. "The town itself isn't very big," he answered, "but some of the farmlands are. Where _have_ you been to?"

The Beast was silent.

Seeing that he'd already managed to force his host into his question-evading attitude, Quatre felt he might as well follow his query up with, "You're a prisoner here, aren't you? You can't go beyond the outer hedge."

The Beast turned and began to move away in the swift, stooped walk he always used when he was upright, clearly toward the door.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," Quatre sighed. "Please don't leave."

Somewhat to his surprise, as this had never worked before, the Beast paused. Half a moment later, however, Quatre realized that it wasn't in response to the apology and request, but to something he'd seen farther along. The Beast moved past the door and almost out of sight around the curve of the tower, then crouched down.

Curious, Quatre abandoned the telescope entirely and stepped after him, asking, "What is it?"

As the Beast turned, Quatre was a little startled to hear an unexpected sound, like the chirping of a forlorn bird, seeming to come straight from him. He realized an instant later, however, that it was, in fact, coming from an actual forlorn bird that the Beast now cradled in his great hands. Quatre hurried forward, with an exclamation of sympathy and surprise, to gaze at the tiny creature held by the much larger one.

The bird was mostly black and white and pale brown, but where one of its wings didn't seem to want to fold properly over its back he could see a stretch of pretty green. It ducked its head and chirped distressedly again as he looked at it, evidently not liking his proximity much, though it didn't seem at all afraid of the Beast. He took half a step back so as not to alarm it, watching pityingly as it shook its awkwardly-bent wing in an even more awkward motion and made another unhappy noise.

"Is it broken?" Quatre asked, almost in a whisper. He was referring to the bird's wing, and probably should have been more specific, but the Beast seemed to understand.

"I don't know," he rumbled. "She can't fly. She was hopping around over there trying."

"Poor thing... what can we do?" Quatre was looking around, up in the eaves beneath the round tiled roof, hoping to find a nest or some other sign of whence the bird had come.

"She's a chaffinch," the Beast informed him. "They usually nest in the forest. I don't know what she's doing here." Even as he said this he turned toward the door into the tower again, and carried the bird very carefully in that direction.

"Maybe she was attacked by a bigger bird," Quatre speculated as he followed.

The Beast made a sound indicating this was as good a theory as any.

"So she's a chaffinch, you said." Quatre was already being forced to move at a quicker pace as the Beast traversed the staircase in the tower's interior with his usual swiftness. "Do you know a lot about birds?"

"The local types," replied the Beast briefly.

In his earlier days at the palace, Quatre might have entertained some dark speculations as to why this was, but by now he'd had it specifically confirmed that the Beast was a herbivore. "What will you do with her?" he asked next.

"Put her in the aviary until she heals."

"Oh, that's a good idea; the birds in there are so friendly."

It seemed to be the Beast's intention to descend the spiral stairs all the way to the third floor, and as they passed the door onto the sixth, Quatre noticed it standing open. This was unusual, but he realized after not too long why it must be: Trowa joined them presently, wordlessly, with traces of paint on his hands; he must have been in the art room, and have requested that the doors remain open so he might hear when Quatre was finished on the tower.

Quatre explained what was going on as they hastened down after the Beast. In doing so, he was struck with another thought, and asked the Beast in some concern, "Do you think she has eggs?"

"At this time of year they'd probably be hatched," was the somewhat grim answer. "They might even be fledglings by now. We can only hope so."

As usual when they entered the aviary, the most social of the birds came fluttering over to land on their shoulders and arms; Quatre noticed that some even of the less energetically friendly ones did the same to the Beast, clinging to his thick fur as they did to the clothing of the humans. It was always interesting to see how other animals responded to the Beast: there was consistent interest and camaraderie where Quatre would have expected fear and avoidance.

The little chaffinch was at first skittish and reluctant to be introduced to the birds that hopped down the Beast's arms to peer at and comment on her; she fluttered and chirped in alarm, and the Beast had to keep her in one hand and hover the other above her so she wouldn't fall and so the other birds would not at first get too close. The very gentle way he did this suggested to Quatre that perhaps this was not the first time he'd brought the aviary's inhabitants a new friend and patient; it made the human wonder, as he had wondered on most days for the last few months, just how long the Beast had been here living like this - for how often did you encounter injured birds, really?

Eventually the chaffinch calmed enough to allow some of the others nearer to her; one bright blue something (Quatre had no idea what it was), which was forever grooming its neighbors, began to nose around the chaffinch's wings as if in search of something to do. Seeing this, the Beast, who had been standing still to allow the introductions to progress, moved again, startling some of his passengers into flight; he went to the golden filigree alcoves along one wall and gently placed the chaffinch in one.

Here Quatre observed another thing the Beast was not made for: picking up a handful of anything granulated. The birdseed from the decorated tin rolled off the convex curve of the pads on his thick fingers, and he was left with barely any. Evidently trying not to frighten the birds, he attempted to stifle his growl of frustration. Quatre was not surprised when Trowa immediately stepped forward to help him, taking up a handful of his own and scattering it across the little shelf that jutted out from the injured bird's alcove. Soon a number of birds had gathered there to peck at the seed and chatter at each other, the poor chaffinch among them.

Silently the two humans and their huge host watched the birds for some time. It was good to see the chaffinch enjoying the meal and being offered such friendly treatment by the others; surely she would heal effectively here - though how quickly, Quatre couldn't begin to guess. If she had eggs or chicks at home, he honestly doubted she would be able to return to them before some unpleasant fate overtook them. It was sad, but there was nothing to be done about it; Quatre just hoped the bird had a resilient spirit.

At last the Beast gave a satisfied nod and turned. "I'll check on her again later." And he began moving toward the door, undoubtedly heading back to the library.

"And we should find some lunch, I think," Quatre added.

As they ate on the balcony next door, they discussed Trowa's disliking of the view from the tower, as well as various other high places they'd visited in the past and how Trowa had felt about them. Thereafter, Quatre bullied his friend into disclosing what he would like to spend the afternoon doing, which turned out, somehow, to be just about what Quatre had been thinking might be nice - a walk through the grounds and then perhaps a game of croquet - and they set out to do it.

When on the way down and out of the palace Quatre let out a sudden cry of, "Hey! Stop!" Trowa appeared momentarily startled - but then obviously either realized what Quatre must have seen, or caught sight of her himself.

'Her' was definitely the right term; Quatre had been under the impression, the last couple of times they'd glimpsed this person, that it was a man - but in fact, now that he got a better look at the face and figure, he was beginning to think that this mysterious woman and the other they sometimes saw were one and the same.

She was dressed now in old-fashioned men's clothing, which was what had misled them before - hose and high boots beneath her long tunic, all in the warm colors of the palace - and her brown hair was pulled into two braided buns at the base of her skull. Spectacles gleamed over her eyes, but even with this slight impediment it was easy to observe a facial expression so diametrically opposite the one she wore in her other garb (assuming Quatre's theory was correct and it was the same person) as to be positively startling: the previous had been gentle and sad and pensive, whereas this was hard, calculating, and very direct.

Direct as it was, though, it was not directed at them for more than the moment it took to take all of this in and start hastily in her direction in the hopes that she would remain stationary long enough to talk to this time. Then she turned away and immediately entered a door that swung silently open for her the way doors always did around here. Quatre called again for her to wait, but by now there was very little hope in his tone, or in the motion by which he followed into the room she'd entered. He knew it would be empty of life; he knew he could not speak to her.

Half a pace into the cheerfully-lit but utterly lonely room, he clenched his fists in frustration. "It's been _months_," he muttered. "But we still know next to nothing about anything around us." It wasn't just the unknown woman; it was the unmapped palace in the middle of the forest, the unnamed sleeping men in their opposite courtyards, the unnerving sense of loneliness that hung in the air like a cold mist, and their unfathomable host that had the shape of a monster, wouldn't tell them anything, and was kind to little birds.

Trowa, standing in the doorway behind him, put a hand on his shoulder. There was nothing he could say to banish this frustration, but his presence was a comfort in itself. As long as he had Trowa with him, Quatre knew, he would never _really_ lose hope; he would never reach that point the Beast had once told him wasn't so unlikely; he could always carry on.

That didn't mean it wasn't still extremely agitating, though.

One of the many things Quatre liked and admired about Trowa was that he rarely seemed to worry about things he couldn't help. Oh, he acknowledged them; he simply very coolly and logically only spent his energy on circumstances where he might be able to make a difference... even if this just meant enjoying a relaxing walk through gardens and game of croquet in the face of an extremely frustrating situation. Seeing the wisdom in this, Quatre had been attempting to learn the skill. He wasn't very good at it yet, but he did, at least, get plenty of practice; every quiet afternoon with Trowa brought him a little closer to more consistent complacency.

So they were both in a decent enough mood by the time the sun set and they headed inside to eat, and quite happy to see the Beast and talk to him about the day. He was never interested in discussing at dinner what he'd been reading in the library earlier, but he always seemed to enjoy hearing about what Quatre and Trowa had been up to. And eventually he asked, clearly hopeful, about their plans for after supper.

Quatre answered, "I want to use the telescope again, now that it's dark enough to see the stars."

"Oh," said the Beast, sounding disinterested and perhaps a little disappointed. Quatre remembered what he'd said earlier about never using the device at night. It seemed odd to him still, but, then, what about the Beast did not?

Trowa, however, nodded and said, "I'll keep working on my painting, then."

"Oh?" This time the Beast's tone indicated a good deal more engagement. "Are you painting something?"

"I'm trying." Trowa shrugged a little. "It's enjoyable, but I'm afraid I'm not very good at it."

"That's how I feel too," the Beast replied. Quatre remembered the way those great hairy hands had held the mallets for that interesting instrument, and tried to imagine the Beast painting.

"You're welcome to join me," Trowa said. Perhaps he too was curious to see the Beast paint, or perhaps he was just being considerate. Lately they'd been going outside with the Beast after supper more frequently to play games in the sporting yard or just sit on the swings in the children's yard while he jumped around. Trowa probably didn't want him to feel they were deliberately trying to avoid him. Or perhaps he was genuinely interested in the Beast's company; there had been a bit more of that lately too.

Whatever the motive behind it, the invitation seemed to please the Beast. Cheerfully he said, "I think I will! I'll come paint a wonderful picture and then put it on a wall somewhere! That sounds like fun!"

Quatre smiled as he went on eating. There was another thing that had been changing: the Beast's deleterious effect on Quatre's appetite was decreasing. If Quatre hadn't had a few years' worth of lean pickings to recover from, he might already have been genuinely concerned about his weight.

But now the Beast seemed so excited by the prospect of painting that he was attempting to convince them to abandon what was left on their plates with all the insistence he had previously exercised toward that end without intending to or realizing that he did so. Quatre thought he had been reminded of the existence of the art room by the conversation - like people that, living in a town near some celebrated natural wonder, only ever went to enjoy it when they had guests - and was more than a little eager to find out if it was everything he remembered. Quatre couldn't help being amused by him, as he not infrequently was these evenings, and tried to eat more quickly.

Eventually they were all three walking through the halls and up the many staircases to the sixth floor and the tower above it. Well, the Beast wasn't 'walking;' he never walked during one of his energetic moods. He ran up and down the corridors that Quatre and Trowa traversed at an easier pace, bounded up staircases seven steps at a time and then came leaping back down to check that the humans hadn't gotten lost, and sprang out from around corners trying to startle them (which only worked the first couple of times).

Upstairs they divided forces, and, though Quatre was looking forward to seeing the stars through the telescope, he left his companions with some reluctance. Besides being entertained by the Beast and curious about his painting abilities, he didn't much like being separated from Trowa and completely alone. As long as they were together, Quatre had found, they were protected from the loneliness of this place, but even a few minutes apart - for whatever reason, even the washroom - allowed it all in again, chilling and miserable.

Perhaps this was the reason Quatre did not spend as much time as he'd planned on the tower. The stars were every bit as fascinating as he had expected, but he wanted to get back to Trowa. If he planned on indulging this interest in the telescope at all in the future, he would need to learn to deal with the atmosphere. The Beast had, but who could guess how long _that_ had taken? Quatre thought working up to it wasn't a bad idea.

When he entered the art room, he observed Trowa and the Beast down at the other end, close together, looking at a canvas on an easel. As Quatre made his way toward them, he heard the Beast demand, "What do you mean, 'What is it?' It's a carnival wagon, obviously!"

"Oh," said Trowa doubtfully. "Of course."

"Just because I finished faster than you-" the Beast began, but cut himself short. The brush he held in one furry fist, which he'd been shaking at Trowa in reproachful emphasis, had spattered a not inconsiderable amount of bright blue paint onto Trowa's grey tunic.

With one eyebrow elevated, Trowa raised a hand to swipe up the largest blob on the end of one finger.

"Sorry!" said the Beast. The growling laughter in his tone fired a sort of prescience like an an arrow right into the caution center of Quatre's brain. He'd almost reached them, but now he stopped.

Trowa flicked the paint back at the Beast. It dappled the fur just above the huge nose a cheery blue.

"You've opened hostilites," the Beast growled softly, reaching behind him toward where the tins of paint he'd been using still stood open.

"You drew first blood," Trowa replied in an equally dark tone, his hand also moving slowly toward something Quatre couldn't see from this angle (since he was now backing away).

"We will never surrender!" roared the beast. And the hostilities, as he'd put it, began.

It was actually worse than Quatre had expected. Laughing helplessly, he was forced to take shelter behind a large, board-mounted canvas he dragged off a shelf, only peeking out every now and then to see how the battle progressed.

With that snakelike speed and litheness and that laughter like a dog's bark, the Beast darted here and there with a tin of paint and a brush, seeking what most warriors sought: to strike without being struck. Trowa, wearing a grim expression Quatre had seen on his face many times but with an unaccustomed sparkle in his eyes, pursued with single-minded determination and something that dripped orange.

Golden yellow flew and fuchsia red spattered, and Quatre was laughingly calling out to them that it wasn't too late for peace talks, and the Beast's fur was a wet rainbow, and Trowa's clothes were simply ruined and his face looked as if he'd been in a _real_ fight with all the bruise-colored blotches that covered it; and they only finally stopped when the easel holding the Beast's painting, which had been a sort of centerpiece to the combat, got rattled a little too hard and threw its burden to the floor.

Hastily setting aside his weapons, Trowa gingerly reached down and lifted the fallen painting by its sides. As he replaced it on the easel he said, "Oh..." The Beast also relinquished the tin and brush and came to look. Sensing an end to aggression for now, Quatre deemed it safe to join them, though he (not having destroyed his clothing) picked his way over very carefully; there was paint _everywhere_.

The Beast's painting was... a mess. Quatre found himself shaking his head as he looked at it, as if trying to clear his vision for another attempt at making sense of the wild jumble of colors. After a moment, he realized that, while some of the chaos before him had been splashed or smeared or splattered onto the canvas during the paint fight, some of it had been brushed on purposefully beforehand... if 'brushed' could be an appropriate word for strokes that looked as if they'd been made by a two-year-old.

Quatre thought his head was beginning to ache as he tried to pick the accidental apart from the deliberate and (futilely) to find the shape of a carnival wagon somewhere in there. He didn't know what to say. He might not have known what to say about it originally, not really wanting to bring up the subject of the Beast's ill-formed hands, and now the thing was ruined.

The Beast had been for several moments making that low, pensive growling noise that was more characteristic of his less energetic morning moods. Finally he said decisively, "This is a _thousand_ times better like this. What do you guys think?"

"You... think so?" Quatre managed, fairly neutrally.

"It's a collaboration now, though!" The Beast threw a brightly-speckled arm across Trowa's shoulders. "What do you think, Trowa? Won't it look good in a frame? Should we both sign it?"

Trowa, Quatre noticed, remained rock-still without the slightest flinch under that huge friendly arm. "_Can_ you sign it?" he wondered, placid and daring.

"Well, no," the Beast admitted. "You'll have to sign it for me. And then it can go up somewhere!"

Quatre restrained a laugh at the enthusiasm that would actually seriously consider hanging something like this on any wall; meanwhile, Trowa, with some effort, freed himself from the hairy arm that was smearing more green and orange onto his shoulders and the back of his neck and head, and started looking through the paintbrushes on a nearby table for one that had escaped the devastation. "What color should I use?" he wondered.

"See if you can find any more of this red!" replied the Beast eagerly. Then he went back to staring at the painting. Quatre couldn't decide whether he was making the best of a bad situation or really did like the insane outcome of his little step away from maturity with Trowa.

"There's probably enough left on my chest," said Trowa.

Quatre laughed. Then he continued to laugh as he watched Trowa write carefully in the lower right hand corner of the painting, _Trowa and Beast_, with the small brush he'd chosen and red paint off his mottled tunic.

"We'll call it _The Spoils of War_!" the Beast announced, pleased. Quatre laughed again.

Finished, standing back, Trowa coughed suddenly, speckling with color from his lips the already spotted arm he drew in front of his face. "I got a mouthful of that purple earlier," he explained somewhat brokenly.

"It tastes terrible, doesn't it?" The Beast sounded a little smug.

"It's not so bad," replied Trowa, now in what must have been a rather maddening deadpan.

The Beast growled. Then, "I'm going to go decide where I want to put it!" he said, and bounded toward the door.

"That paint will be hard to get out of your fur if you let it dry!" Quatre called after him, though he wasn't sure the Beast heard any of it. He couldn't help laughing again as he turned back to Trowa. "He's so funny..."

Trowa nodded his colorful head.

Quatre grinned. "And I haven't seen _you_ play around like that in years."

In response to this Trowa just shrugged and started walking, so Quatre followed him. They paused beside another canvas-bearing easel, this one having gone untouched by flying paint as it was a few yards and facing away from where the battle had taken place. Quatre's brows rose as he looked at it.

"Trowa... didn't you specifically say you weren't very good at this?"

"It turned out better than I expected," Trowa admitted.

"We never painted, did we?" Quatre went on musingly. "Olivie always did, but we never really tried it. No wonder we didn't know you could do it so well."

With a little shrug, Trowa said nothing.

"I can't say I think much of your subject, though."

Wryly Trowa replied, "It was the first thing that came to mind."

Quatre continued to stare pensively at the unexpectedly attractive painting, reflecting that everything about his life seemed suddenly contradictory, or bittersweet at the very least. He was a guest to whom no place was forbidden, yet he knew almost nothing about his surroundings. His host was kind and friendly, yet had the form of a monster and had demanded of him a lifetime's penitence for a trifling offense. His lifetime's penitence took him forever from a family he loved, yet Quatre felt it not impossible that he might be happy here. And the happiness he might have felt for his friend's sake at discovering a heretofore unknown talent was marred and twisted by the fact that Trowa had chosen for his first subject a rose of the same pale blue-grey as the one that had originally trapped him here... here in this palace away from the family he loved, where he knew almost nothing about his surroundings, where it wasn't impossible that he might be happy...

The darkness and confusion of these thoughts must have shown on his face - he'd never been any good at hiding such things - for Trowa said his name in a tone of concern and reached out a hand. The latter was still wet with paint in places, and, as Trowa must have realized this, only hovered above Quatre's shoulder.

Quatre shook his head. "Nothing. I'm just impressed at this secret talent of yours." And he forced a smile.

Trowa nodded slowly, still appearing concerned, and Quatre's smile grew more genuine in rueful amusement as he considered the double standard that precedent could sometimes create. _He_ could easily be expected to divulge his every thought and feeling simply because he so consistently did, but it would be unheard-of for him to press the unreadable Trowa to explain what was going on in _his_ head. Not that that ongoing riddle wasn't part of the charm, and, anyway, of greater concern at the moment was the _exterior_ of Trowa's head.

"Come on," he said, turning away toward the door. "We should go get you cleaned up before that stuff dries in your hair."

...

...

...

The song had started again, haunting and compelling and beautiful and heart-breaking, the very moment he'd set foot in the water. Heero wasn't the least bit surprised anymore. In fact, besides the pity and curiosity that filled him as a natural reaction to such forlorn and pathetic singing, the only thing he felt was guilt.

He knew Duo didn't want him to come here anymore. Duo had never explicitly said so, but Heero had seen it in his eyes, heard it in his tone, felt it in his embrace every night for the last week since Heero had told him about the first instance of the mysterious song. And Heero wasn't even quite sure why he continued to worry his lover by insisting on bathing here when it would be such a small sacrifice to give it up and thereby satisfy Duo.

At first it had been his disdain for the entire yara myth. This pool was convenient - especially as compared to bathing with basin and sponge or hauling water to fill a tub - and he'd been unwilling to change his habits just because somebody was playing a prank on him. Darl, he'd thought, must have convinced one of his female friends to take the part of the legendary yara to try to frighten him.

But now... seven nights had passed since then, and each time he'd returned here he had heard the song again. He doubted Darl or anyone Darl might befriend had the patience to wait for his appearance - especially uncertainly timed as it always was - and put on such a show without fail so many days in a row. Beyond that, he did have to admit that there was an unearthliness to the sound of the voice that he hadn't noticed or acknowledged at first... an uncanny, haunting quality to the song that he doubted anyone in the area could effect without his having heard of their talent before.

And then, there surely were many marvels in the world. He'd heard plenty of stories of magical, ungodly beings; this yara tale was nothing that did not fit into that catalog. So why did he return? There was possibly a murderous spirit here that seemed to have specifically targeted him, and it deeply worried Duo to know that Heero kept coming... so why didn't he just stay away? Was it the compelling nature of the song? Was he half-hypnotized already and unaware of it? Or was it simple curiosity, a desire to know the truth of the situation before he could entirely abandon it?

In any case, here he was again beginning the usual bathing process and listening to the haunting melody as he was growing accustomed to doing. Except that there was something a little different about the song tonight... he couldn't quite decide what had changed, but some quality clearly had; the voice sounded more pointed tonight, more purposeful, more... present...

Up Heero's spine ran a shiver that had nothing to do with the coldness of the water. He'd already waded out to where the latter was thigh-deep, but now he stopped and repeated the thorough visual inspection of the pool that always began his time here - or had, at least, all this past week.

The shadows cast by the forest on the water's circumference were blue and deep purple, and beyond, between the trees themselves, solid black except for where the moonlight stabbed down to bring all the true colors back to life. And across the pool from him and somewhat to his left, half in shade the color of Duo's eyes and half invisible in the blackness, a figure stood.

It was pointless to ask who was there or demand she step forward; Heero knew who it was, and that she was unlikely to obey any command of his. It was funny; he'd never really completely believed in her before, and now, suddenly, he believed in her before he'd even properly seen her. Something about the slender shadow out there at the deepest end of the pool beneath the trailing willow-fronds was compellingly, almost painfully convincing; he couldn't have denied her existence if he'd wanted to, even if he were to turn away this moment and never actually see her. And the song, previously impossible to trace, was now clearly coming specifically from that darkness.

As Heero noted that the figure was slowly moving in his direction, he took a step or two back, retreating toward the shore and a coward's escape even as another impulse, nearly as strong, urged him to walk rather toward her and find out the truth. Logic told him to turn and run, but his heart wanted to go to her, try to soothe her intolerable sadness and change her song to one of joy. Something told him that he could, that he had the power to mend her broken heart... if only he would go to her.

The yara's slow steps and the widening ripples that attended them brought her eventually out of the enveloping shadows into the moonlight, at which point Heero jerked to a stop, unable to continue moving away. His gaze was locked on her form now glowing faintly in the light of moon and stars into which she'd stepped; he could not tear his eyes from her.

He wondered abstractly how, dressed in shining white as she was and with skin only a touch darker, she had managed to shroud herself so effectively in shadows in the first place; he wondered a good deal more avidly where it was that he'd heard the description 'incredibly beautiful' in regards to this woman. It seemed an insultingly lackluster way to refer to her.

Beneath her fine-woven white shift, such as she might have worn under a court gown or wedding dress, she was all perfect curves and soft flesh, to which the semi-transparent garment clung in form-baring wetness. Similarly her shining dark hair fell slickly, cleanly down her back in a single smooth, streaming mass. And her sorrowful face, running with water as though she'd just emerged from the depths of the pool or as if with tears, was like a flawless gem through which a gentle light glowed.

She was beyond 'beautiful.' She was perfect, marvelous enough to break the world and sad enough to have reason to. Heero thought her singing would certainly break _him_, and, though he had no particular desire for her person, it made her, in his eyes, all the more pathetic that she was so wonderful. That such an angelic being should suffer thus was unendurable, and he wanted more than anything to comfort her. If he went to her now and put his arms around her, if he held her tightly enough, surely he could help her... surely he could fight off her despair and save her... And since he had no interest in her in any other sense, surely Duo would not mind.

Duo...?!

Guilt and horror rose in him abruptly, a burning hot contrast to the chilly pity and sorrow, as he realized that, for a few moments, he had completely forgotten about his lover. After protesting so vehemently the idea that he could do so, after feeling real pain at Duo's quiet insistence that he might, still it had happened without thought or struggle. He, who had considered himself so steadfast, so devoted, had given in without a fight, and was, in fact, the weakest and most despicable of men.

If he'd been expecting anything, it was that the yara would try to draw him with her beauty, to seduce him properly, and in this he had placed his faith - for surely someone with Duo in his life could find nothing along those lines even remotely tempting in comparison. He hadn't anticipated that the yara would attack from a completely different side, playing on his sympathies until the desire to help and comfort her overwhelmed all other emotions and his better judgment. Heero had no sisters, nor had any woman ever filled that role for him, but if his mother had survived giving birth to him and lived to bear a female child, that child might have grown to be very much like the person in front of him.

She was still singing, though more softly now that she was here with him, still piercing his heart with the sadness and loss in her beautiful voice, still beckoning - challenging him, almost, to try to comfort her. And despite knowing his danger, despite recognizing her tactics, despite remembering Duo's concern, Heero still could not push away the pity he felt, nor his desire to help the yara.

He also still could not move, and she was coming closer. She did not, he noted, walk quite on top of the water, but rather in it up to her ankles, as if it were only very shallow around her, though at that end of the pool it was deeper than a man was tall. Her steps were slow, but unrelenting; it wouldn't take her long to cross to the shallower side... and a man could drown in an inch of water as easily as when completely submerged. This was exactly what Duo had warned about...

Duo...

A slender ivory arm lifted as the yara extended a hand toward him, and Heero felt his own hand rising as if to accept everything she offered. Which was a miserable, ignominious death that would not even bring her the peace she claimed he could give, not even fulfill the desire with which he would have approached her in the first place, and the absolute certainty never to see Duo again.

Duo...!

That thought was simply too much. The pain Heero felt on the yara's behalf and in response to her miserable song and tearstained face was eclipsed utterly by the horror of the idea that he might never see Duo again... never hear his infectious laugh or charmingly unorthodox opinions, never hold him in the grass under the stars, never make love to him again...

His hand that had risen and pushed forward now jerked abruptly back, clutching at his chest, seeking the one connection he had to Duo here and now: the leather pouch he wore around his neck that contained the lock of hair Duo had given him. His fumbling fingers found it, his hand clutched it desperately to him... and everything changed.

The flavor of the atmosphere, the feel of the cold water, the sound of the yara's song, even the colors of the shadows and the moonlight seemed altered. Heero had suddenly in his mind such a clear image of Duo... the taste of his lips, the texture of his skin, the alternating cheer and darkness of his voice, every perfect curve or shadow of his face, and everything he was that went beyond physical description, every aspect of him that Heero had fallen so completely in love with... he sensed it all so perfectly that it seemed more than a memory... it was almost as if he'd somehow conjured Duo up as an invisible presence at his side. And the rest of the world simply could not compare.

The yara's forward movement paused; she was little more than a yard away now, her beauty and pathos all the more apparent as she drew so near. But she must have observed that her hold over Heero's mind had waned. Slowly, in a movement that wrenched his heart with the forlornness of its admission of defeat, her arm fell to her side, and the sorrow of her song increased.

Quickly then Heero scrambled backward, out to the shallower water and onto the gravel beach, never releasing his grip on the talisman at his neck. This was still a distinctly unsafe place to be, and if he wanted to live to beg Duo's forgiveness for coming here at all tonight, he needed to put it behind him as quickly as possible. That was just a figure of speech, of course, since he didn't intend for a moment to turn his back on the yara.

Clumsily continuing to retreat from her where she remained motionless in the pool not far from where he'd only recently been standing, he reached blindly for the clothes he'd left on the shore, still clutching at the leather pouch with his other hand. He wasn't even entirely certain he'd managed to take hold of all his possessions before he continued moving away from the pool and the yara, but it didn't matter; he could return during daylight to look for anything he'd left.

Or maybe, he thought at the unnerving sight of the yara sinking abruptly down into the water and disappearing, her song diffusing into the haunting placelessness it had always previously held, he could just cut his losses and avoid this terrible place for the rest of his life.


End file.
